Evaluating alternative models of youth externalizing using quantitative genetic analyses

Interest has increased in the recent literature on characterizing psychopathology dimensionally in hierarchical models. One dimension of psychopathology that has received considerable attention is externalizing. Although extensively studied and well-characterized in late adolescents and adults, delineation of the externalizing spectrum in youth has lagged behind. As a complement to structural analyses of externalizing, in this study, we use quantitative genetic analyses of twin data to adjudicate among alternative models of youth externalizing that differ in granularity. Specifically, we compared model fit, estimates of genetic and environmental influences on the externalizing dimension, and the average, variability, and precision of genetic and environmental influences on individual symptoms due to the externalizing dimension, specific symptom dimensions, and unique etiological influences. Given that none of these criteria are definitive on their own, we looked to the confluence of these criteria to exclude particular models while highlighting others as leading contenders. We analyzed parent-report data on 38 externalizing symptoms from a population-representative, ethnically diverse sample of 883 youth twin pairs (51% female), who were on average 8.5 years old. Although models including an externalizing composite and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, and conduct disorder diagnoses and symptom dimensions showed similar heritability to latent variable models of externalizing, models that included latent dimensions of externalizing and more fine-grained symptom dimensions fit better and were more balanced in the magnitude of genetic and environmental influences on individual symptoms due to the externalizing dimension and specific symptom dimensions. Pending replication, these more granular and elaborated model(s) can be useful for advancing research on causes and outcomes of youth externalizing and its fine-grained specific components. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

A multivariate approach to understanding the genetic overlap between externalizing phenotypes and substance use disorders

Substance use disorders (SUDs) are phenotypically and genetically correlated with each other and with other psychological traits characterized by behavioural under-control, termed externalizing phenotypes. In this study, we used genomic structural equation modelling to explore the shared genetic architecture among six externalizing phenotypes and four SUDs used in two previous multivariate genome-wide association studies of an externalizing and an addiction risk factor, respectively. We first evaluated five confirmatory factor analytic models, including a common factor model, alternative parameterizations of two-factor structures and a bifactor model. We next explored the genetic correlations between factors identified in these models and other relevant psychological traits. Finally, we quantified the degree of polygenic overlap between externalizing and addiction risk using MiXeR. We found that the common and two-factor structures provided the best fit to the data, evidenced by high factor loadings, good factor reliability and no evidence of concerning model characteristics. The two-factor models yielded high genetic correlations between factors (rg s ≥ 0.87), and between the effect sizes of genetic correlations with external traits (rg  ≥ 0.95). Nevertheless, 21 of the 84 correlations with external criteria showed small, significant differences between externalizing and addiction risk factors. MiXer results showed that approximately 81% of influential externalizing variants were shared with addiction risk, whereas addiction risk shared 56% of its influential variants with externalizing. These results suggest that externalizing and addiction genetic risk are largely shared, though both constructs also retain meaningful unshared genetic variance. These results can inform future efforts to identify specific genetic influences on externalizing and SUDs.

A broad internalizing dimension accounts for the genetic associations between personality and individual internalizing disorders

Much research has demonstrated that psychopathology can be described in terms of broad dimensions, representing liability for multiple psychiatric disorders. Broad spectra of psychopathology (e.g., internalizing and externalizing) are increasingly used as targets for research investigating the development, etiology, and course of psychopathology because they account for patterns of relatedness among disorders that were once presumed distinct. Thus, these spectra represent alluring targets due to their comprehensive and parsimonious nature. Nevertheless, little research has established the role of individual disorders over and above broad dimensions in the study of psychopathology. In the current study, we investigate whether there are unique etiological associations between individual internalizing disorders and personality traits after accounting for their etiological associations with a broad internalizing dimension. We used a community sample of twins (Npairs = 448) ages 4 to 19 to examine the etiological associations between internalizing psychopathology and Big Five personality dimensions. In terms of genetic covariation, a broad internalizing dimension was positively associated with neuroticism and negatively associated with extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness. Moreover, internalizing accounted for most of the genetic variance shared between individual internalizing disorders and personality traits. Nevertheless, there were unique genetic associations between the following pairs of personality traits and disorders: neuroticism and social anxiety, extraversion and social anxiety, agreeableness and depression, and conscientiousness and compulsions. There was little evidence of environmental influences shared between internalizing and personality. In sum, a broad internalizing dimension adequately accounted for almost all of the etiologic covariation between internalizing disorders and personality, with several interesting exceptions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

The role of parental genotype in the intergenerational transmission of externalizing behavior: Evidence for genetic nurturance

The purpose of this study was to examine possible pathways by which genetic risk associated with externalizing is transmitted in families. We used molecular data to disentangle the genetic and environmental pathways contributing to adolescent externalizing behavior in a sample of 1,111 adolescents (50% female; 719 European and 392 African ancestry) and their parents from the Collaborative Study on the Genetics of Alcoholism. We found evidence for genetic nurture such that parental externalizing polygenic scores were associated with adolescent externalizing behavior, over and above the effect of adolescents' own externalizing polygenic scores. Mediation analysis indicated that parental externalizing psychopathology partly explained the effect of parental genotype on children's externalizing behavior. We also found evidence for evocative gene-environment correlation, whereby adolescent externalizing polygenic scores were associated with lower parent-child communication, less parent-child closeness, and lower parental knowledge, controlling for parental genotype. These effects were observed among participants of European ancestry but not African ancestry, likely due to the limited predictive power of polygenic scores across ancestral background. These results demonstrate that in addition to genetic transmission, genes influence offspring behavior through the influence of parental genotypes on their children's environmental experiences, and the role of children's genotypes in shaping parent-child relationships.

Multivariate analysis of 1.5 million people identifies genetic associations with traits related to self-regulation and addiction

Behaviors and disorders related to self-regulation, such as substance use, antisocial behavior and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, are collectively referred to as externalizing and have shared genetic liability. We applied a multivariate approach that leverages genetic correlations among externalizing traits for genome-wide association analyses. By pooling data from ~1.5 million people, our approach is statistically more powerful than single-trait analyses and identifies more than 500 genetic loci. The loci were enriched for genes expressed in the brain and related to nervous system development. A polygenic score constructed from our results predicts a range of behavioral and medical outcomes that were not part of genome-wide analyses, including traits that until now lacked well-performing polygenic scores, such as opioid use disorder, suicide, HIV infections, criminal convictions and unemployment. Our findings are consistent with the idea that persistent difficulties in self-regulation can be conceptualized as a neurodevelopmental trait with complex and far-reaching social and health correlates.

Testing structural models of psychopathology at the genomic level

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have revealed hundreds of genetic loci associated with the vulnerability to major psychiatric disorders, and post-GWAS analyses have shown substantial genetic correlations among these disorders. This evidence supports the existence of a higher-order structure of psychopathology at both the genetic and phenotypic levels. Despite recent efforts by collaborative consortia such as the Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology (HiTOP), this structure remains unclear. In this study, we tested multiple alternative structural models of psychopathology at the genomic level, using the genetic correlations among fourteen psychiatric disorders and related psychological traits estimated from GWAS summary statistics. The best-fitting model included four correlated higher-order factors - externalizing, internalizing, thought problems, and neurodevelopmental disorders - which showed distinct patterns of genetic correlations with external validity variables and accounted for substantial genetic variance in their constituent disorders. A bifactor model including a general factor of psychopathology as well as the four specific factors fit worse than the above model. Several model modifications were tested to explore the placement of some disorders - such as bipolar disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and eating disorders - within the broader psychopathology structure. The best-fitting model indicated that eating disorders and obsessive-compulsive disorder, on the one hand, and bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, on the other, load together on the same thought problems factor. These findings provide support for several of the HiTOP higher-order dimensions and suggest a similar structure of psychopathology at the genomic and phenotypic levels.

Construct validity of youth psychopathic traits as assessed by the Antisocial Process Screening Device

The study of psychopathic traits in youth is in its nascent stages and the nature and the structure of these traits is still poorly understood. In one of the most comprehensive analyses to date of the construct validity of the widely used Antisocial Processing Screening Device (APSD), we used two independent samples of youth, one community (N = 2203) and one clinic-referred (N = 534), ages 4 to 19 (51% female), to investigate the external correlates of the Callous-unemotionality (CU), Narcissism, and Impulsivity dimensions of youth psychopathy. We used parent reports of externalizing and internalizing psychopathology, personality, and aggressive behavior to examine the pattern of associations between psychopathic trait dimensions and relevant external correlates. Across both samples, CU was positively related to all forms of externalizing psychopathology and aggression, mostly unrelated to internalizing psychopathology, and negatively related to agreeableness and conscientiousness. Narcissism and Impulsivity were positively related to externalizing psychopathology, and aggression, negatively related to agreeableness and conscientiousness, and weakly positively related to internalizing psychopathology. In most cases, each dimension of the APSD manifested statistically significantly different relations with these external correlates. Many of our findings replicate and extend work conducted with both youth and adults, although others suggest that these dimensions do not distinguish among psychopathological domains in conceptually expected ways. Broadly speaking, these findings provide evidence that psychopathic traits in youth are best characterized by a multidimensional model and bear implications for models integrating normative with pathological personality. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Correction to: The Association of Oxytocin Receptor Gene (OXTR) Polymorphisms with Antisocial Behavior: A Meta-analysis

The original version of this article inadvertently omitted the word "with" between "Polymorphisms" and "Antisocial" from the title. The title "The Association of Oxytocin Receptor Gene (OXTR) Polymorphisms Antisocial Behavior: A Meta-Analysis" should be "The Association of Oxytocin Receptor Gene (OXTR) Polymorphisms with Antisocial Behavior: A Meta-Analysis." as presented above.

Measuring the hierarchical general factor model of psychopathology in young adults

There is evidence that models of psychopathology specifying a general factor and specific second-order factors fit better than competing structural models. Nonetheless, additional tests are needed to examine the generality and boundaries of the general factor model. In a selected second wave of a cohort study, first-order dimensions of psychopathology symptoms in 499 23- to 31-year-old twins were analyzed. Using confirmatory factor analysis, a bifactor model specifying a general factor and specific internalizing and externalizing factors fit better than competing models. Factor loadings in this model were sex invariant despite greater variances in the specific internalizing factor among females and greater variances in the general and specific externalizing factors among males. The bifactor structure was robust to the exclusion of any single first-order dimension of psychopathology. Furthermore, the results were essentially unchanged when all overlapping symptoms that define multiple disorders were excluded from symptom dimensions. Furthermore, the best-fitting bifactor model also emerged in exploratory structural equation modeling with freely estimated cross-loadings. The general factor of psychopathology was robust across variations in measurement and analysis.

The nature and correlates of the dark triad: The answers depend on the questions

The past several decades have witnessed a proliferation of research on the dark triad (DT), a set of traits comprising Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy. The bulk of DT research has been marked by several core assumptions, most notably that each DT construct is a monolithic entity that is clearly separable from its counterpart DT constructs. To examine the tenability of these assumptions, we pooled data from 2 samples of North American community members (ns = 312 and 351) to explore (a) the external validity and profile similarities of DT indicators and (b) the factor structure of the DT. Using general personality dimensions as external criteria, we demonstrated that each DT measure is multidimensional and that subdimensions within DT measures often display sharply different and at times even opposing relations with personality domains; these opposing relations were largely obscured at the total score level adopted in most of the DT literature. In both samples, confirmatory factor analyses and exploratory structural equation models provided no clear support for the traditional tripartite DT structure delineated in the literature. Instead, various aspects of the DT constructs fractionated across a number of factors that represented more basic personality elements (e.g., emotional stability, grandiosity). Taken together, our findings raise serious questions regarding the standard model of DT research and suggest that the questions posed regarding the correlates of DT constructs hinge crucially on the specific DT measure and subdimension examined. (PsycINFO Database Record

External validity of a hierarchical dimensional model of child and adolescent psychopathology: Tests using confirmatory factor analyses and multivariate behavior genetic analyses

Several recent studies of the hierarchical phenotypic structure of psychopathology have identified a General psychopathology factor in addition to the more expected specific Externalizing and Internalizing dimensions in both youth and adult samples and some have found relevant unique external correlates of this General factor. We used data from 1,568 twin pairs (599 MZ & 969 DZ) age 9 to 17 to test hypotheses for the underlying structure of youth psychopathology and the external validity of the higher-order factors. Psychopathology symptoms were assessed via structured interviews of caretakers and youth. We conducted phenotypic analyses of competing structural models using Confirmatory Factor Analysis and used Structural Equation Modeling and multivariate behavior genetic analyses to understand the etiology of the higher-order factors and their external validity. We found that both a General factor and specific Externalizing and Internalizing dimensions are necessary for characterizing youth psychopathology at both the phenotypic and etiologic levels, and that the 3 higher-order factors differed substantially in the magnitudes of their underlying genetic and environmental influences. Phenotypically, the specific Externalizing and Internalizing dimensions were slightly negatively correlated when a General factor was included, which reflected a significant inverse correlation between the nonshared environmental (but not genetic) influences on Internalizing and Externalizing. We estimated heritability of the general factor of psychopathology for the first time. Its moderate heritability suggests that it is not merely an artifact of measurement error but a valid construct. The General, Externalizing, and Internalizing factors differed in their relations with 3 external validity criteria: mother's smoking during pregnancy, parent's harsh discipline, and the youth's association with delinquent peers. Multivariate behavior genetic analyses supported the external validity of the 3 higher-order factors by suggesting that the General, Externalizing, and Internalizing factors were correlated with peer delinquency and parent's harsh discipline for different etiologic reasons. (PsycINFO Database Record