Children that are expressing or are exposed to risk factors experience an elevated risk of developing later psychosocial maladjustment, such as conduct problems. However, all children exposed to risk do not express conduct problems, but develop normally. The aim of the present study was to examine potential protective factors among children exposed to risk, that separate children expressing conduct problem behavior from those who do not. In the study, preschool teachers and parents of 298 three- to five-year-old children participated. Risk factors of the individual, conduct problem behavior, and relationship oriented protective factors were examined. The results indicate that positive peer relationships are important for preschool children´s psychosocial development, while family factors, such as parent's disciplinary style, seem less important.

Conduct problems are among the most prevalent psychiatric conditions identified in outpatient mental health centers (Frick 1998b; Kazdin, 1995; Loeber, Burke, Lahey, Waters, & Zera, 2000). Despite a long history of examining risk factors associated with conduct problems, many studies have focused exclusively on adolescent onset conduct problems and few studies have sought to examine relationships among risk factors across several domains. Furthermore, few studies have been conducted to examine protective factors thought to mitigate the risk for children who are thought to be at a high risk of manifesting conduct problems. By gaining an understanding of risk and protective factors associated with early onset conduct problems, clinicians can develop and appropriately target interventions to those children at a high risk of developing conduct problems as well as those who are already displaying symptoms associated with early onset conduct problems. The purpose of the present study was to identify factors associated with an increased risk of early onset conduct problems across several domains and to develop a statistical model describing the relationships among these latter domains and risk factors. Furthermore, the present research used these identified risk factors in order to study factors that may offer protective benefits to children who are at a high risk of developing conduct problems at a younger age. The data used in the present study were from the National Survey of Children's Health database which contained data collected in 2007. These data were analyzed using a confirmatory factor analysis approach and multi-group structural equation modeling techniques. The results showed that living in a poorer quality neighborhood, coming from a lower socioeconomic status, and having a mother who reported overall fair or poorer mental health were all risk factors associated with reported early onset conduct problems. Protective factors identified included having a higher quality parent-child relationship and not having a history of involvement in special education. The implications of these findings are discussed as are future directions for research.

The growing number of young children exhibiting conduct problems is a cause of serious concern for many early childhood teachers. Past research has shown that child centred play therapy (CCPT) may be effective for addressing conduct problems. However, little research has been carried out to study the impact of CCPT on children exhibiting these problems, through training early childhood teachers in using CCPT strategies. Therefore, the goal of this pilot study was to explore whether young children who have persistent conduct problems in early childhood settings in New Zealand would show improved behaviour following their early childhood teachers learning some play-therapy strategies. It also aimed to gather information from teachers about the suitability of play therapy strategies within the context of the New Zealand early childhood system. Two early childhood teachers and two children, aged 4 years participated in the study. Following the teachers’ training, a decrease in problem behaviour and a notable increase in positive play behaviour were observed for the two child-participants. These positive changes corresponded with the improved Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) (Goodman, 1997) scores as measured by the teachers. The Total Difficulties scores gained for both children were in the clinical range at the beginning of the study and had improved to the normal range at the followup. The results also showed that the teachers appeared to have benefited from the training and were very satisfied with the intervention outcomes. They found the training acceptable and intended to continue using play therapy strategies in their centre. The findings of the current study extend previous research by demonstrating the teachers’ ability to deliver CCPT strategies. Some limitations of the current study included the limited number of observations during baseline, utilising teachers involved in the CCPT training as the source of data on children, and the absence of the parent report measures. The study findings have some important implications for early childhood centres and for further research.

ABSTRACT Conduct problems are a common childhood mental health problem representing a significant proportion of young clients referred for occupational therapy. Children with conduct problems, especially the early onset subtype, can experience a difficult developmental trajectory and this can also impact family members, peers and the broader community. The contours of family life in Australia, and many other western countries, have changed dramatically over the last few decades. For example, we have witnessed a large increase in single parent households, a dramatic increase in maternal employment, declines in fertility rates to well below replacement level, delayed parenthood, and an increase in divorce rates. Consequently both parents and children must navigate a much more varied and in some cases more challenging and stressful set of life course choices and pathways than in the past. For some this will result in changes to parenting practices and children’s time use, potentially exposing children to a higher risk for developing conduct problems. While there is evidence to support the important role played by parents in this context, the relative impact of how and with whom children spend their time has not been closely examined. The aims of this study are to understand how young Australian children spend their time and to examine how children’s time use is related to their risk of developing conduct problems. More specifically it aims to investigate the social context of activities in which children are involved, the extent to which these activities involve physical exertion, structure, and rest and recuperative qualities in relation to conduct problems. In addition, children’s exposure to out-of-family care, differences in parenting practices and socioeconomic factors are also considered. The study is unique in having access to recent, high quality, national level Australian survey data that combines both detailed information on children’s time use, validated scales measuring children’s conduct problems, as well as a range of other variables necessary to accurately measure the relationships between them. These data come from the 4 to 5 year old child cohort from Wave 1 of the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC) survey. The LSAC is the first comprehensive national longitudinal study of Australian children and is funded by the Australian Government Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaHCSIA). The LSAC follows the lives of two cohorts of approximately 5,000 children each, an infant cohort (0-1 years old in Wave 1) and a child cohort (4-5 years old in Wave 1). This study examines the 4-5 year cohort only. A key strength of the LSAC is its use of time diaries to collect detailed information on children’s time use. It is the analyses of data from these diaries that is unique to the current study of conduct problems and allows the presentation of the first results that combine detailed measures of children’s time use with conduct disorder outcomes. First, descriptive analyses reveal the prevalence of children at risk of developing conduct problems, the variety of parenting practices and children’s time use profiles. Approximately 29% of Australian children aged 4 to 5 years are identified as being “at risk” of conduct problems. Parenting practices for children demonstrate high levels of warmth, reasoning, consistency, and low hostility. Children are reported to experience adequate amounts of sleep or rest, on average 11 hours per day. Over a quarter of children do not engage in moderate to vigorous physical activities, particularly on weekdays, over half do not engage in structured activities on weekdays and well over three-quarters do not engage in structured activities on weekends. Children are highly supervised by adults for approximately 10 hours a day either with or without the presence of peers during their waking hours, whereas almost three quarters of children do not spend time alone and over a half do not spend time with peers only. Second, two-way ANOVAs and random effects models are used to compare children’s time use by their experience of conduct problems. Results derived from the two-way ANOVAs indicate that children at risk of conduct problems spend significantly fewer hours being restful on weekdays, significantly more hours without peers under adult supervision on weekends and significantly fewer hours with peers under adult supervision on weekends than those not at risk. Results from the random effects models show that children at risk of developing conduct problems spend significantly more hours bike riding and significantly fewer hours being restful than those not at risk. Overall these results suggest that children at risk of conduct problems used time differently from those not at risk, particularly those aspects of time which are restful, involve bike riding, and in supervised social contexts. Third, chi-square tests and univariate logistic regression both affirm a higher risk of boys developing conduct problems (1.31 times more likely) than girls. Multivariate logistic regression with random effects is used to model the risk for developing conduct problems for boys and girls. The female model indicates that girls are at lower risk of conduct problems only if they are exposed to consistent and less hostile parenting practice and not have sleep problem reported by parents. The male model suggests that boys are vulnerable to more risk factors and are at lower risk of developing conduct problems if they have fathers who have completed tertiary education, are exposed to consistent and less hostile parenting, do not ride a bike on weekdays, spend less time in exercise on weekends, and do not have sleep problem reported by parents. Overall, the findings of this thesis lead to three main conclusions. First, males are at heightened risk for developing conduct problems and are subjected to more risk factors than girls. Second, parenting practice is affirmed in this thesis as the paramount predictor of risk for 4 to 5 year old children developing conduct problems. Third, the effects of time use depending on the innate quality and structure of activity are considered important for young children’s risk of developing conduct problems, and this is particularly pertinent for young boys. These results support the importance of family-centred services and time arrangements for activity participation when working with children at risk of or diagnosed with conduct problems. It also affirms the necessity to attend to parenting practices which may be described as hostile and inconsistent while at the same time highlighting the importance of fathers to their sons risk profile. These findings contribute to our understanding of children’s time use as a contributor to the behavioural wellbeing of children, especially young boys.

Callous-Unemotional (CU) traits are characterized by limited empathy, lack of guilt or remorse, and callous use of others. They are a risk factor for adult psychopathy, especially when comorbid with conduct problems. Thus, efforts to identify risk factors and consequences of CU traits have been prominent. One construct that may act as both a risk factor for and consequence of CU traits among youth is anxiety. While the most consistent finding is in this literature is a negative relation between CU traits and anxiety, findings have been mixed. The present study examined bidirectional relations between three subtypes of anxiety (i.e. physiological anxiety, fear and concentration problems, and worry and oversensitivity), CU traits, and conduct problems over six months among a sample of primarily African American middle school students. Results showed that CU traits at Time 1 were not associated with changes in physiological anxiety, fear and concentration problems, or worry and oversensitivity at Time 2. Similarly, physiological anxiety, fear and concentration problems, and worry and oversensitivity at Time 1 were not associated with increased CU traits at Time 2. Further, no longitudinal relations were found between CU traits and conduct problems. The six-month timeframe may have been too short to see changes in anxiety and CU traits given their stability. The models tested also did not take into account the impact of factors such as distress and trauma which may influence bidirectional relations between CU traits and anxiety.

No description available.

According to differential susceptibility theory (DST), some children may be more sensitive to both positive and negative features of the environment. However, research has generated a list of widely disparate temperamental traits that may reflect differential susceptibility to the environment. In addition, findings have implicated these temperament × environment interactions in predicting a wide variety of child outcomes. This study uses a novel evolutionary model of temperament to examine whether differential susceptibility operates in a domain-general or domain-specific manner. Using a racially and socioeconomically diverse sample of 243 preschoolers and their parents (56% female; 48% African American), we examined the interactions between maternal and paternal parenting quality and two evolutionary informed temperament profiles (i.e., Hawks and Doves) in predicting changes in teacher-reported conduct problems and depressive symptoms from preschool to first grade. Results suggest that differential susceptibility operates in a domain-specific fashion. Specifically, the "Hawk" temperament was differentially susceptible to maternal parenting in predicting externalizing problems. In contrast, the "Dove" temperament was susceptible to both paternal and maternal parenting quality in predicting changes in depressive symptoms. Findings provide support for an integrative framework that synthesizes DST with an evolutionary, function-based approach to temperament.

The present study examines how an accumulation of risk and protective factors impacts the development of juvenile delinquency and conduct problems in late adolescents. Risk factors may have a negative impact early on in a youth’s life, and protective factors such as positive parenting may alleviate or diminish the impact those risk factors may have. The sample consisted of 499 participants aged 18 to 36 years who attend a southeastern university. Participants completed surveys that measure friend’s delinquent behavior, parenting practices, neighborhood cohesion, exposure to community violence, delinquency, and conduct problems. Results of ANOVAs indicate that cumulative effects of several risk factors and the absence of protective factors are more strongly associated with conduct problems and juvenile delinquency than any single risk factor alone. Participants with five or more risk factors were at greater risk for developing delinquent behavior and conduct problems than participants with fewer risk factors.

No description available.

The early onset of externalizing behaviour problems (EBP) is associated with negative outcomes later in life, such as poor mental health, substance use, crime, and unemployment. Some children also develop conduct disorder (CD), entailing a high disease and economic burden for both individuals and society. Most studies on the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of parenting interventions targeting EBP among children have evaluated selective or indicated preventive interventions, or treatment strategies. Evidence on the effectiveness of universally delivered parenting programmes is controversial, partly due to methodological difficulties. The overall aim of this thesis was to 1) address the methodological challenges of evaluating universal parenting programmes, and to 2) employ different health economic methods to evaluate parenting interventions for EBP and CD in children. Study I indicated that offering low intensity levels of Triple P universally, with limited intervention attendance, does not result in improved outcomes, and may not be a worthwhile use of public resources. Study II showed that using the distribution of an outcome variable makes it possible to estimate the impact of public health interventions at the population level. Study III supports offering bibliotherapy to initially target CP in children, whereas Comet could be offered to achieve greater effects based on decision-makers’ willingness to make larger investments. Cope could be offered when targeting symptom improvement, rather than clinical caseness. The economic decision model in Study IV demonstrated that Triple P for the treatment of CD appears to represent good value for money, when delivered in a Group format, but less likely, when delivered in an Individual format. To reduce the burden of mental health problems in childhood, cost-effective and evidence-based interventions should be provided on a continuum from prevention through early intervention to treatment. We believe our results can assist decision-makers in resource allocation to this field.