Preschool Oppositional Defiant Disorder: A Disorder of Negative Affect, Surgency, and Disagreeableness

Temperament Traits Mark Liability for Coexisting Psychiatric Symptoms in Children With Elevated ADHD Symptoms

Objective: Among children with ADHD, coexisting psychiatric disorders are common and associated with greater impairment and symptom persistence. Given that temperament traits are easily measured, developmentally stable, and variable among youth with ADHD, temperament profiles may be clinically useful for predicting liability for coexisting psychiatric symptoms in this population. Methods: Eighty-three children with ADHD symptoms participated. Caregivers rated their child's surgency, negative emotionality, and effortful control, as well as severity of internalizing and externalizing psychiatric symptoms. Hierarchical linear regressions were conducted to estimate associations between temperament traits and psychiatric symptoms, controlling for severity of ADHD. Results: Temperament ratings explained significant variance in psychiatric symptoms above and beyond ADHD symptoms alone. Symptoms of each coexisting psychiatric disorder was associated with a distinct temperament and ADHD symptom profile. Conclusion: Temperament ratings appear to have clinical utility for predicting coexisting psychiatric symptoms in children with elevated ADHD symptoms.

Treatment Response among Preschoolers with Disruptive Behavior Disorders: The Role of Temperament and Parenting

Objective: This study examined associations between temperament (negative affect, effortful control, and surgency) and symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) within a diverse preschool sample. Interactions between temperament and parenting in the prediction of ADHD/ODD symptoms before and after an 8-week early intervention program (i.e., Summer Treatment Program for Pre-kindergartners; STP-PreK) were also examined.Method: The sample included 215 children (Mage = 5.0, 80.9% male, 84.7% Latinx) with a diagnosis of ADHD and/or ODD who completed the STP-PreK. Temperament was measured via parent report while ADHD/ODD symptoms were assessed via combination of parent and teacher report. Positive and negative parenting were assessed via rating scales and a standardized parent-child interaction observation.Results: Higher surgency was associated with greater symptom severity of ADHD/ODD pre- and post-treatment. Higher negative affect was associated with greater symptom severity of ODD pre- and post-treatment, while higher effortful control was only associated with lower symptom severity of inattention pre-treatment. Positive parenting predicted lower symptom severity of ADHD/ODD post-treatment. Moderation analyses indicated that the benefits of low levels of negative parenting only occurred when paired with low temperament risk for symptoms of hyperactivity and ODD. Additionally, only the combination of high surgency and high observed negative parenting resulted in greater symptom severity of ODD. Finally, decreases in inconsistent discipline predicted decreases across all symptom domains post-treatment.Conclusions: Our findings add to the temperament-based model of ADHD/ODD by highlighting temperament's unique prediction of treatment response as well as important interactions with the caregiving environment.

Identifying the Inter-Domain Relations Among ODD, CD, and CU Traits in Preschool Children Using Network Analysis

Oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) and conduct disorder (CD) are two of the most common forms of disruptive behavior disorders during childhood. Callous-unemotional (CU) traits are an important factor in understanding the presentation of these externalizing forms of psychopathology. ODD, CD, and CU traits are highly related constructs, yet little work has examined how these externalizing forms of psychopathology are related at the domain level. The current study utilized network analysis to identify the distinct domains that explain the associations among ODD, CD, and CU traits. In a sample of 104 preschoolers (M age = 4.76), results demonstrated that the symptom domains of (a) angry/irritable mood and argumentative/defiant behavior, (b) aggression to people and animals, and (c) callousness were the primary bridge domains for ODD, CD, and CU traits, respectively. Findings of the current study offer a more nuanced insight into the relations amongst ODD, CD, and CU traits. Identification of bridge symptom domains can inform intervention practices by targeting specific symptom domains that are contributing to the maintenance of such aggressive and disruptive behaviors.

Temperamental Constellations and School Readiness: A MultiVariate Approach

This study uses canonical correlation analyses to explore the relationship between multiple predictors of school readiness (i.e., academic readiness, social readiness, and teacher-child relationship) and multiple temperamental traits using data from the second wave (age 54 months, n = 1226) of the longitudinal Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development (SECCYD; NICHD ECCRN 1993). This longitudinal study collected data on a large cohort of children and their families from birth through age 15. For academic readiness, only one temperamental constellation emerged, representing the construct of effortful control (i.e., high attentional focusing, high inhibitory control). For peer interactions, two significant constellations emerged: "dysregulated" (low inhibitory control, low shyness, and high activity), and "withdrawn" (high shyness, low inhibitory control, low attentional focusing). Finally, the analyses exploring child-teacher relationships revealed two significant constellations: "highly surgent" (high activity, low inhibitory control, low shyness) and "emotionally controlled" (low anger/frustration and high inhibitory control). Results of this study form a more nuanced exploration of relationships between temperamental traits and indicators of school readiness than can be found in the extant literature, and will provide the groundwork for future research to test specific hypotheses related to the effect temperamental constellations have on children's school readiness.

Exploring childhood temperament as a moderator of the association between adolescent sexual minority status and internalizing and externalizing behavior problems

INTRODUCTION

Sexual minority youth experience worse mental health compared to their heterosexual peers, reflecting the consequences of sexual minority-based stigma. Previous research has focused on contextual variation to understand variability within this vulnerability. Childhood temperament factors such as negative affect, effortful control and surgency/extraversion are important for understanding differential susceptibility to environmental stressors. The objective of the current study was to understand how childhood temperament factors, measured prior to the most difficult developmental period for sexual minority youth, moderated the association between sexual minority status and internalizing and externalizing behavior problems.

METHODS

Youth reporting same-sex attraction in an ongoing longitudinal project on the development of conduct problems in Quebec, Canada were matched with heterosexual peers, for an analytic sample of 280 youth (62% girls). Structural equation models were used to examine (1) the association between youth-reported same-sex attraction (ages 13-16) and parent and youth-reported internalizing and externalizing problems a year later at ages 14-17, and (2) the moderating role of temperament (ages 6-9) in this association between sexual minority status and internalizing and externalizing problems.

RESULTS

Same-sex attraction was associated with higher levels of youth-reported internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. Surgency/extraversion moderated the association between sexual minority status and youth-reported internalizing and externalizing problems.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings suggest that temperament linked to individual visibility may be important for understanding variation in self-reported mental health among sexual minority youth, and supports the use of developmental constructs like temperament to better understand vulnerability to psychosocial difficulties within this population.

Understanding how and why effortful control moderates children's vulnerability to interparental conflict

This study examined the moderating role of effortful control in the association between interparental conflict and externalizing problems in a diverse sample of preschool children (N = 243; M age = 4.60 years). Using a multimethod, multi-informant, prospective design, findings indicated that the relation between interparental conflict and externalizing problems was only significant among children with poor effortful control. Children with high effortful control appeared to be protected against the negative effects of interparental conflict exhibiting low levels of externalizing problems despite increasing levels of interparental conflict. Toward identifying the mechanisms underlying the protective effects of effortful control, mediated moderation analyses indicated that children's effortful control protects children against interparental conflict by reducing their angry reactivity to interparental conflict. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Oppositional Defiant Disorder Dimensions: Associations with Traits of the Multidimensional Personality Model among Adults

The occurrence of Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD) behaviours among adults has been supported by a proportion of scholars. The current work examines potential ODD dimensions and their associations with the primary personality traits of Tellegen's [57] multi-dimensional conceptualization during adulthood. Two independent, general community, adult groups [Group 1: N = 214; mean age (SD) = 35.74 (16.60); Group 2: N = 205; mean age (SD) = 29.00 (12.42)] completed the Current Symptom Scale involving the eight ODD criteria. Group 2 additionally addressed the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire -Brief Form (MPQ-BF). A series of Confirmatory Factor Analyses (CFA) were implemented. The three-dimensional ODD conceptualization of Burke and colleagues [14] referring to "Negative Affect", "Oppositional Behavior", and "Antagonistic Behavior" was confirmed. Considering personality traits, valuable associations were revealed between Oppositional Behavior and Aggression, Antagonistic Behavior and Social Potency as well as Harm Avoidance, and finally, Negative Affect and Stress Reaction, as well as Aggression. The dimensionality of ODD behaviours in adulthood and its correspondence with particular personality traits is approached in the context of psychological practice.