Alterations in hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis function may underlie the relation between childhood maltreatment and nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) behaviors. This study examined how co-occurring patterns of maltreatment types influenced adolescent NSSI behaviors and the mediating role of diurnal cortisol, using a longitudinal design. The sample included 295 Chinese adolescents ( = 10.79 years, = 0.84 years; 67.1% boys). The study employed latent profile analysis to identify childhood maltreatment patterns and conducted path analysis to examine the mediating mechanism. Four maltreatment patterns were identified: (67.8%), (15.6%), (10.2%), and (6.4%). Furthermore, compared to the profile, adolescents in the profile were at increased risk for later NSSI behaviors through higher waking cortisol levels, while those in the profile were at increased risk through a steeper diurnal slope. Disturbances in diurnal cortisol rhythm serve as a pathway through which childhood maltreatment "gets under the skin" to lead to adolescent NSSI behaviors. These findings offer promise for identifying maltreated youth at risk for NSSI behaviors and informing targeted prevention strategies.

Parental mentalizing, or the parent's capacity to think about the child as having an inner psychological world, has been shown to play an important role in sensitive parenting and child socioemotional development. Studies suggest that high levels of stress impair (parental) mentalizing, yet surprisingly few studies have experimentally investigated this. The present study aimed to address this gap by investigating the impact of child-focused stress on parental mentalizing measured using a newly developed self-report questionnaire, following an experimental design with a computer-controlled baby simulator in a sample of 29 community mothers. Both subjective arousal, measured by a self-report item, and biological arousal, assessed through galvanic skin response, were measured throughout the experiment. Attachment dimensions, childhood trauma, and borderline personality disorder (BPD) features were assessed at baseline. Results demonstrated that the induction of child-focused stress was associated with an increase in parental mentalizing difficulties. Increases in mentalizing difficulties were, in turn, associated with increases in subjective and biological arousal following the simulator task. Finally, attachment anxiety and childhood trauma were positively correlated with both arousal and parental mentalizing difficulties in the simulator task, whereas attachment avoidance and BPD features were not. The implications of these findings for early intervention are discussed.

Maternal affect contributes to children's psychosocial adjustment. How maternal daily affect intensity and dynamics (i.e., inertia and variability) are associated with adolescents' psychopathological symptoms, however, remains unclear. This preregistered study examined (1) associations of maternal day-to-day positive and negative affect intensity, inertia, and variability with psychopathological symptoms in adolescence and young adulthood, and (2) how mother-adolescent affect congruency moderates these associations. Mother-adolescent dyads ( = 488) reported positive and negative affect in 75 daily assessments across ages 13 - 17 years. Adolescents rated their psychopathological symptoms at ages 14 - 18, 20, and 27 years. Maternal affect intensity was associated with adolescent psychopathological symptoms, while maternal affect dynamics were inconsistently associated with symptoms in young adulthood. Mother-adolescent affect congruency only moderated the effects of positive affect intensity and variability, in that high-congruent adolescents reported lower internalizing symptoms at age 20 than low-congruent adolescents. No other interaction effects were found. While maternal affect intensity and dynamics seem to contribute to youth psychopathology, evidence for the role of mother-adolescent affect congruency remained limited.

This study examined whether childhood adversity, specifically threat-related adversity, was associated with within-person changes in the cortisol awakening response (CAR) and diurnal cortisol slope (DCS), and whether these changes predicted increased depressive symptoms during adolescence. We also explored sex differences. In total, 283 first-year secondary school students in Belgium ( = 12.48 years; = 0.39; 42.8% female) participated in six assessments over 2.5 years. Childhood adversity (psychological, physical, and sexual victimization) reported at the first three waves was averaged. CAR and DCS latent residual change scores were derived from salivary cortisol samples collected during waves 1 and 3. Depressive symptom changes were assessed in linear growth curve models using self-reports from waves 3 to 6. The childhood adversity × sex interaction significantly predicted CAR and DCS changes, indicating a blunted CAR across waves for victimized boys, and a blunted DCS for victimized girls. Childhood adversity predicted the depressive symptoms intercept. No other predictors were associated with the depressive symptoms intercept, and none were linked to the depressive symptoms slope. Thus, childhood adversity may be linked to changes in diurnal cortisol patterns that differ by sex. Evidence for diurnal cortisol changes as a pathway to increased depressive symptoms remains inconclusive.

Delayed reward discounting (DRD), the tendency to prefer smaller rewards available immediately relative to larger rewards available after a delay, is associated with numerous health outcomes across the lifespan. Emerging literature points to the central role of early environments, specifically factors reflecting harshness (including lack of resources) and unpredictability (exposure to instability and stressful events) in the development of DRD. Yet, existing research uses disparate indicators of environmental risk and often draws on small samples resulting in conflicting findings, making comparisons across studies challenging. The current systematic review examined environmental factors that may place youth at greatest risk for heightened DRD and subsequent negative health outcomes. Search results identified 28 articles reflecting 20 unique samples. Additionally, meta-analyses were conducted to examine overall effects for the two most commonly examined environmental predictors (family income and family history of substance use disorder). Results suggest small-to-medium associations of environmental risk with DRD, with smaller associations observed for more distal predictors of harshness (e.g., family income) and larger associations among more proximal indicators of environmental instability (e.g., harsh parenting and parental pathology). Findings highlight the role of environmental factors on DRD development and may inform future interventions.

Research has robustly demonstrated that children exposed to early ecological adversity are at risk for developing antisocial, externalizing behavior problems (rule breaking, aggression, disregard for others). Yet, studies have also demonstrated multifinality in developmental pathways unfolding in adversity's aftermath, with many children showing remarkable resilience. Understanding sources of such resilience is critical, especially across different populations (Luthar et al., 2006, 2015). In Family Study (FS, 102 low-risk mothers, fathers, and infants) and Play Study (PS, 186 high-risk mother-toddler dyads), we test a model of parent-child attachment security, observed at 15 months in FS and 2.5 years in PS, as a moderator of effects of early family ecological adversity, assessed as a cumulative score of sociodemographic risks (graded for severity) at 7 months in FS and 2.5 years in PS, on children's antisocial, externalizing problems, observed and parent-reported at 5.5 years in FS and 7 years in PS. We supported moderation for mother-child relationships in both studies: Higher early family adversity was associated with more antisocial outcomes five years later, but only for children with less secure attachments. We highlight the key role of early security as a protective factor and a source of resilience for children in families experiencing adversity.

Exposure to adverse life events (ALE) during the prenatal and early postnatal period has been linked to social cognition impairments in offspring, but whether effects differ by developmental stage and domain of social cognition remains unclear. This study examined the role of maternal ALE exposure from early pregnancy to 8 weeks postpartum in offspring social communication and emotion recognition from childhood to adolescence.

Infant self-regulation is shaped by early physiological systems and caregiver-infant co-regulatory interactions. Maternal perinatal (pre- and/or postnatal) depression may affect these processes and infants' development of this critical construct. However, literature addressing the association between maternal perinatal depression and infant self-regulation has been mixed. We conducted a pre-registered meta-analysis of the association between maternal perinatal depression and several self-regulation constructs (e.g., effortful control, executive function) measured during the first 2 years of life. We included 68 reports comprising 193 effect sizes and 16,722 mother-infant dyads. On average, studies included an equal number of male and female infants, and, for most (68%) studies, most participants were White. Average infant age ranged from 0 - 16 months. Three-level random effects meta-analytic models indicated a small, significant overall association, with higher levels of depression associated with lower self-regulation ( = -.10, 95% CI = -.14, -.06, < .001). There was substantial heterogeneity in this pooled effect. Subsequent analyses indicated moderation by methodological and conceptual variables. Evidence that maternal perinatal depression is associated with lower infant self-regulation underscores the importance of supporting dyads experiencing perinatal depression. Clarifying this association highlights a critical next step of examining potential causal processes linking maternal and infant well-being.

This study employed a cross-lagged panel network model to examine the longitudinal relationships between problems of sleep, internalizing and externalizing problems in adolescents.

Contingent responses in which caregiver and child build on each other's positive behavior may attenuate the deleterious effects of early adversity on youth mental health and neuroendocrine functioning. 159 caregiver-child dyads (child age: 6-16 years; 50.9% male; 44.6% adversity-exposed in stable arrangements with adoptive caregivers) participated in a 6-min conflict resolution task, which was coded for second-by-second changes in caregivers' and children's behavior (κ's >0.78). Caregivers reported on their child's mental health problems; youth hair cortisol concentration was obtained. Caregiver contingent responses to their children (i.e., responding to their partner's positive social communication with active efforts to facilitate emotion regulation and/or problem-solving) attenuated the effects of adversity on child anxiety and conduct disorder symptoms. Stronger positive child contingent responses to their caregivers attenuated the effects of adversity on child depressive, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder symptoms, and oppositional defiant symptoms. Positive contingent transactions are health-promotive interaction sequences that could be targeted in transdiagnostic intervention programs.

Methylation alterations of the glucocorticoid receptor gene () may help explain why not all individuals experiencing insensitive parenting develop behavior problems, yet evidence from human cohorts remains limited. This longitudinal study examined associations among methylation, caregiver parenting, and child internalizing and externalizing behaviors. A total of 224 Han Chinese preschoolers = 47.33 ± 9.60 months; 42.5% girls) were recruited from Jinan, China, in 2021 (T1). Parenting quality and child behavior problems were reported by both parents, and methylation across 46 cytosine-phosphate-guanine sites in the exon 1F promoter region was sequenced from buccal cells. Follow-up assessments were conducted 1.5 years later among 113 children who stayed in the same kindergarten ( = 63.60 ± 7.68 months; 45.7% girls). methylation at baseline moderated the association between parenting and baseline, but not follow-up, behavior problems, consistent with differential susceptibility. Children with lower methylation exhibited more behavior problems under low-quality parenting but fewer under high-quality parenting. This interaction did not vary between parental and child sex, or I (rs41423247) and I (rs10052957) polymorphisms. Findings highlight the dynamic nature of Epigenome × Environment interactions and suggest that lower methylation may act as a plasticity factor in preschool children.

Early identification of risk for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms can enable more timely interventions and improve long-term outcomes. While previous research has linked various maternal and perinatal factors to ADHD, few studies have examined these predictors collectively in a single comprehensive analysis. This study aimed to assess whether later ADHD symptoms can be predicted from information available at birth, specifically ethnicity, maternal metabolic markers, mental health, and socioeconomic status. It additionally aimed to identify the most influential predictors. Using data from the Born in Bradford (BiB) study, we applied multiple linear regression (LR) and machine learning techniques to predict ADHD symptoms as measured by the Hyperactivity/Inattention subscale of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). A 10-fold cross-validated LR model explained 6.97% of the variance in SDQ scores. In the random forest model, infant male sex and maternal smoking during pregnancy emerged as the top predictors. These findings provide proof of principle for early identification of children at risk of ADHD. Future models may benefit from incorporating additional perinatal data to improve predictive accuracy.

Research finds genetic predisposition for depression is associated with increases in depression across adolescence and adulthood. In turn, depressive symptoms in adolescence are associated with substance use. However, there has been modest examination of genetic predisposition for depression, growth in depressive symptoms, and substance use from late childhood through adolescence, and mostly in White samples. Also, psychosocial interventions can attenuate associations between genetic predisposition and psychopathology, a genotype by intervention (GxI) effect. We examined associations among polygenic risk for depression, growth in depressive symptoms from age 7 to 16, and substance use at age 16, as well as moderation by a family-based preventive intervention. Participants were African-ancestry ( = 154) and European-ancestry ( = 219) youth from the Early Steps Multisite Study, half of whom participated in the Family Check-Up intervention. A small polygenic by intervention effect was found on reductions in depressive symptoms for African-ancestry youth, and growth in depressive symptoms was positively associated with substance use at age 16. In sensitivity analyses, a small GxI effect was detected in European-ancestry youth on reductions in depressive symptom slopes from age 10 to 16. These findings highlight how early intervention can buffer genetic effects on depressive symptoms over time.

Childhood maltreatment is a robust predictor of aggression. Research indicates that both maltreatment experiences and aggression are moderately heritable. It has been hypothesized that gene-environment correlation may be at play, whereby genetic predispositions to aggression in parents and children may be confounded with family environments conducive to its expression. Building on this framework, we tested whether maltreatment mediates the association between a polygenic score for aggression (PGS) and school-age aggression, and whether this varied for reactive and proactive aggression.

Callous-unemotional (CU) traits, characterized by lack of empathy, guilt, and deficient affect, are linked to facial emotion recognition (FER) deficits in children. While anxiety is also associated with FER anomalies, these relationships are often examined in isolation despite co-occurrence. This study aims to concurrently investigate unique contributions of CU traits and anxiety on children's FER patterns. We recruited 107 children aged 6 to 11 from community settings, assessing CU traits through caregiver reports and anxiety via caregiver and child reports. FER performance was evaluated using a computer-based task. Results indicate that CU traits negatively impact overall FER accuracy, particularly when controlling for parent-reported anxiety. CU traits were inversely related to total FER accuracy for children self-reporting high anxiety levels. These findings enhance our understanding of how CU traits and anxiety interact to influence FER deficits, suggesting that interventions targeting CU traits should consider anxiety symptoms as a critical factor in emotional processing challenges among children.

Early deprivation holds far-reaching implications for academic performance in adolescence. Yet, the implicated cascading mechanisms remain under-delineated, and little is known about why children may display diverse patterns of cognitive development. To address such gaps, we leveraged long-term longitudinal data derived from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study ( = 2,085). Results indicated that early deprivation (age 3, caregivers' reports and observers' ratings; controlling for early threat and unpredictability) was negatively associated with adolescent academic performance (age 15, adolescents' reports) indirectly through a negative association with cognitive ability in middle childhood (age 9, standardized tests). Furthermore, such an indirect effect was less pronounced among children with higher (versus lower) negative emotionality (age 1, mothers' ratings), given that the negative link between early deprivation and subsequent cognitive ability was weaker among children with higher (versus lower) negative emotionality. Breaking down cognitive ability into sub-components (i.e., working memory, language ability, reading comprehension, and problem-solving), both language ability and applied problem-solving were involved in the deprivation-emotionality interaction. These findings highlight the critical role of cognitive ability in accounting for the long-term academic consequences of early deprivation and the key role of negative emotionality in shaping heterogeneity in such pathways.

Traditionally, early life adversity research has focused on negative outcomes. Contrastingly, the hidden talents framework asserts that many individuals develop specialized abilities as a direct result of their adversity exposure. This framework serves as the foundation for the current study, which systematically reviews extant empirical studies investigating hidden talents or stress-adapted skills in individuals who have experienced early adversity. Synthesizing data through a developmental lens, this review examines how these skills manifest at different stages of development. Guided by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses, we searched four databases and identified 45 eligible studies. Data on country of origin, sample size, predictor and outcome themes, and participant characteristics were extracted. Categorized into cognitive, social, and physiological domains, findings reveal that early adversity was associated with adaptive skills aligned with environmental demands (e.g., heightened emotional awareness, intuitive decision-making, empathy). While cognitive adaptations were the most studied, social and physiological adaptations remain underexplored. Some studies also reported null effects. Future directions include calls for examination of developmental pathways, longitudinal designs, diverse sampling, and culturally responsive approaches to better understand hidden talents and inform strength-based interventions.

Supportive parenting experiences link to secure attachment development, and secure attachment in turn links to children's emotional well-being. However, little is known whether child-factors, like their environmental sensitivity, moderate these associations for better or for worse. We used longitudinal data (three data waves spanning two years) from 614 children (Wave 1: = 10.28; = 0.58; 44% boys). At all waves, attachment was operationalized as children's knowledge of the Secure Base Script with a coded narrative task. Children filled out questionnaires on supportive parenting, their environmental sensitivity and their depressive symptoms. Parents filled out questionnaires on children's internalizing problems. Results: environmental sensitivity moderated the link between supportive parenting and attachment. More sensitive children that perceived their parents as less supportive less likely developed SBS knowledge. Further, environmental sensitivity moderated the link between SBS knowledge and the development of internalizing problems. More sensitive children with less SBS knowledge developed more internalizing problems. The findings support the importance of accounting for environmental sensitivity in attachment research.

Economic hardship is known to shape children's self-regulation, yet little is understood about how fluctuations in hardship unfold over time and whether different patterns of unpredictability carry unique developmental consequences. Using a socioeconomically diverse sample, we tracked families' subjective economic hardship across 15-36 monthly assessments and applied an environmental statistics framework to quantify four indices of unpredictability: changepoints in mean, changepoints in variance, coefficient of variation, and noise. PCA identified two distinct forms of economic unpredictability: one marked by frequent, unpredictable hardship, and another by infrequent but abrupt hardship. Economic unpredictability was disproportionately experienced by racially minoritized and lower-income families in our sample, reinforcing structural inequities in economic resources. Relations between these indices and caregiver-reported measures of family routines and day-to-day unpredictability were weak, suggesting wide heterogeneity in the ways families adapt to economic unpredictability. Leveraging propensity score methods, we isolated the effects of unpredictability from hardship severity, finding that both were associated with greater self-regulation challenges in early childhood, with the strongest effects for hardship severity. These findings underscore the importance of capturing economic hardship as a dynamic and multidimensional experience, with implications for policy efforts aimed at promoting stability in families' access to resources over time.