http://www.iowaaces360.org/uploads/1/0/9/2/10925571/relationship_of_childhood_abuse_and..._1998.pdf

Relationship of childhood abuse and household dysfunction to many of the leading causes of death in adults. The Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study

This chapter suggests that delinquency conceals two distinct categories of individuals, each with a unique natural history and etiology: A small group engages in antisocial behavior of one sort or another at every life stage, whereas a larger group is antisocial only during adolescence. According to the theory of life-course-persistent antisocial behavior, children's neuropsychological problems interact cumulatively with their criminogenic environments across development, culminating m a pathological personality. According to the theory of adolescence-limited antisocial behavior, a contemporary maturity gap encourages teens to mimic antisocial behavior in ways that are normative and adjustive. There are marked individual differences in the stability of antisocial behavior. The chapter reviews the mysterious relationship between age and antisocial behavior. Some youths who refrain from antisocial behavior may, for some reason, not sense the maturity gap and therefore lack the hypothesized motivation for experimenting with crime.

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Adolescence-limited and life-course-persistent antisocial behavior: A developmental taxonomy.

A broader approach to research in hu- j man development is proposed that focuses on the pro- \ gressive accommodation, throughout the life span, between the growing human organism and the changing environments in which it actually lives and grows. \ The latter include not only the immediate settings containing the developing person but also the larger social contexts, both formal and informal, in which these settings are embedded. In terms of method, the approach emphasizes the use of rigorousj^d^igned exp_erjments, both naturalistic and contrived, beginning in the early stages of the research process. The chang- ing relation between person and environment is con- ceived in systems terms. These systems properties are set forth in a series of propositions, each illus- trated by concrete research examples.

Toward an experimental ecology of human development.

This article explores the possibility that romantic love is an attachment process--a biosocial process by which affectional bonds are formed between adult lovers, just as affectional bonds are formed earlier in life between human infants and their parents. Key components of attachment theory, developed by Bowlby, Ainsworth, and others to explain the development of affectional bonds in infancy, were translated into terms appropriate to adult romantic love. The translation centered on the three major styles of attachment in infancy--secure, avoidant, and anxious/ambivalent--and on the notion that continuity of relationship style is due in part to mental models (Bowlby's "inner working models") of self and social life. These models, and hence a person's attachment style, are seen as determined in part by childhood relationships with parents. Two questionnaire studies indicated that relative prevalence of the three attachment styles is roughly the same in adulthood as in infancy, the three kinds of adults differ predictably in the way they experience romantic love, and attachment style is related in theoretically meaningful ways to mental models of self and social relationships and to relationship experiences with parents. Implications for theories of romantic love are discussed, as are measurement problems and other issues related to future tests of the attachment perspective.

/pdf/romantic-love-conceptualized-as-an-attachment-process-1v0qssoz83.pdf

Romantic Love Conceptualized as an Attachment Process

This paper presents a critical appraisal of resilience, a construct connoting the maintenance of positive adaptation by individuals despite experiences of significant adversity. As empirical research on resilience has burgeoned in recent years, criticisms have been levied at work in this area. These critiques have generally focused on ambiguities in definitions and central terminology; heterogeneity in risks experienced and competence achieved by individuals viewed as resilient; instability of the phenomenon of resilience; and concerns regarding the usefulness of resilience as a theoretical construct. We address each identified criticism in turn, proposing solutions for those we view as legitimate and clarifying misunderstandings surrounding those we believe to be less valid. We conclude that work on resilience possesses substantial potential for augmenting the understanding of processes affecting at-risk individuals. Realization of the potential embodied by this construct, however, will remain constrained without continued scientific attention to some of the serious conceptual and methodological pitfalls that have been noted by skeptics and proponents alike.

/pdf/the-construct-of-resilience-a-critical-evaluation-and-2zm15ij070.pdf

The Construct of Resilience: A Critical Evaluation and Guidelines for Future Work

Developmentalists have often conceptualized infant-adult ties in terms of an implicit trait construct evolved from the study of dependency. The major dimension of individual differences has been conceptualized in terms of quantitative differences in the "strength" of attachments, and a variety of discrete behaviors (touch, look, smile, approach, cling, cry) have been assumed to be valid "indices" of this dimension. These behaviors have been assumed to be significantly intercorrelated and stable across situations and over time. Critics have argued strongly that these assumptions cannot be defended empirically. It has further been argued that the study of individual differences in infant-adult ties is unlikely to he a productive research strategy and that attachment (as implying anything more than infant-adult interaction) has outlived its usefulness as a developmental construct. When, however, trait models are abandoned and greater attention is paid to the functions, outcomes, and context sensitivity of attachment behavior and to the underlying behavioral control systems that organize it, the apparent conflict between situational influences and stable individual differences can be resolved. The study of changes in the organization of behavior during development provides a framework for productive individual differences research. When greater emphasis is placed on the organization of behavior, both the stability and the flexibility of attachment behavior can be comprehended, and the attachment construct can continue to play an important integrative role in developmental theory.

Attachment as an Organizational Construct

There is much to digest in a 30 year longitudinal study of the developing person (Sroufe, Egeland, Carlson, & Collins, 2005a). The following paper summarizes some key points regarding the place of ...

/pdf/attachment-and-development-a-prospective-longitudinal-study-4xswrnd71f.pdf

Attachment and development: a prospective, longitudinal study from birth to adulthood.

It is the "developmental" component of developmental psychopathology that distinguishes this discipline from abnormal psychology, psychiatry, and even clinical child psychology. At the same time, the focus on individual patterns of adaptation and maladaptation distinguishes this field from the larger discipline of developmental psychology. In this essay a developmental perspective is presented, and the implications of this perspective for research in developmental psychopathology are discussed. A primary consideration is the complexity of the adaptational process, with developmental transformation being the rule. Thus, links between earlier adaptation and later pathology generally will not be simple or direct. It will be necessary to understand both individual patterns of adaptation with respect to salient issues of a given developmental period and the transaction between prior adaptation, maturational change, and subsequent environmental challenges. Some examples are discussed, with special attention to the case of depression.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/1129832.pdf

The Domain of Developmental Psychopathology.

A perspective on continuity in development and adaptation was proposed and examined in light of data from the second year of life. Within this perspective it is assumed that despite discontinuous advances in developmental level and despite dramatic changes in the behavioral repertoire, there is continuity in the quality of individual adaptation. Such quality is assessed by examining the child's functioning with respect to issues salient for the particular developmental period. In this study the link between quality of attachment in infancy (the organization of attachment behavior) and quality of play and problem-solving behavior at age 2 years was examined in 48 infants. Based on completely independent assessments, infants assessed as securely attached at 18 months were predicted and found to be more enthusiastic, persistent, cooperative, and, in general, more effective than insecurely attached infants in the 2-year assessment. All measures were in the predicted direction; in some cases there was virtually no overlap between groups. The differences apparently were not due to development quotient (DQ) or temperament. The earlier infant behavior also predicted mother's behavior in the 2-year assessment. Implications for developmental theory and research are discussed.

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Continuity of Adaptation in the Second Year: The Relationship Between Quality of Attachment and Later Competence

Background: Cumulative risk research has established the deleterious effects of co-occurring risk factors on child behavior outcomes. However, extant literature has not addressed potential differential effects of cumulative risk at different points in development and has left open questions about whether a threshold model or a linear risk model better describes the impact of cumulative risk on behavior outcomes. The current study examined the impact of cumulative risk factors (i.e., child maltreatment, inter-parental violence, family disruption, low socioeconomic status, and high parental stress) in early and middle childhood on child behavior outcomes in adolescence. Methods: Using data from an ongoing longitudinal study of at-risk urban children (N = 171), the cumulative effects of these five risk factors across early and middle childhood were investigated. Results: The findings support the cumulative risk hypothesis that the number of risks in early childhood predicts behavior problems in adolescence. Evidence for a linear but not a threshold model of cumulative risk was found; the more risks present, the worse the child outcome. Moreover, the presence of multiple risks in early childhood continues to explain variations in predicting adolescent behavior outcomes even after including the effects of risk in middle childhood. Conclusions: The results support the need for comprehensive prevention and early intervention efforts with high-risk children, such that there does not appear to be a point beyond which services for children are hopeless, and that every risk factor we can reduce matters.

L. Alan Sroufe

Papers

Attachment as an Organizational Construct

Attachment and development: a prospective, longitudinal study from birth to adulthood.

The Domain of Developmental Psychopathology.

Continuity of Adaptation in the Second Year: The Relationship Between Quality of Attachment and Later Competence

When More Is Not Better: The Role of Cumulative Risk in Child Behavior Outcomes.