Youth in foster care are disproportionately at risk for developing internalizing and externalizing problems (Lawrence et al., 2006); however, a history of maltreatment prior to foster care placement does not automatically result in poor mental health outcomes. Among non-foster care youth, the quality of family interactions has been related to adjustment outcomes, such that low family cohesion and high family conflict is associated with poor mental health symptoms (Caples & Barrera, 2006). While little is known about these constructs in foster care placements, they may help explain the variance in internalizing and externalizing problems for youth in foster care. The present study aimed to examine whether characteristics of the foster care environment (i.e., conflict, cohesion) across various placement types (i.e., traditional foster homes, group-care settings) could help explain the link between previous maltreatment exposure and mental health problems. The sample included 178 youth in foster care (Mage?=?15.18, SD?=?1.76) and their foster caregivers living in the Midwest. Youth participants completed self-report measures about prior maltreatment history, current family environment characteristics, and youth internalizing symptoms. Foster caregivers completed measures on current family environment and youth externalizing symptoms. Results indicated that caregiver report, but not youth report, of family cohesion was negatively associated with youth report of internalizing problems. When examining the indirect effects, youth report of family conflict partially accounted for the link between youth self-report of maltreatment and internalizing symptoms (B?=?0.106, 95% CI?=?0.026–0.186). Caregiver report of family conflict fully accounted for the association between youth self-report of maltreatment and caregiver report of youths’ externalizing symptoms (B?=?0.108, 95% CI?=?0.005–0.211). Findings highlight the importance of utilizing multiple informants when measuring foster family environment and suggest that family conflict is particularly salient for the mental health of youth in foster care.
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In long‐term studies of psychological development, the initial assessment of etiologically significant child behaviours is often carried out at a single point in time only. However, one‐time assessments of behaviour are likely to possess limited reliability, leading to attenuated longitudinal correlation coefficient magnitudes. How much this bias might have affected behavioural continuity estimates in longitudinal research is presently unknown. Using a data set from the Mauritius Child Health Project, we particularize the attenuating effects of single‐occasion behavioural assessments on consistency estimates of impulsive–aggressive behaviour over time. Specifically, two nursery teachers provided 15 consecutive weekly ratings of the aggressive behaviour of 99 four‐year‐old children. The same children were reassessed for the presence of externalizing behaviour problems at the ages of 8 and 10. There were substantial increases in both reliability and predictive correlation coefficient magnitudes when the preschool scores were aggregated across several weekly ratings. A further increase resulted after the two outcome assessments were combined into a composite score of school‐age externalizing symptoms. A generalized procedure, developed from the correction for attenuation formula, is introduced to describe the relation of aggregation to predictive validity in longitudinal research. 相似文献
ABSTRACTTheories of emotion have often maintained artificial boundaries: for instance, that cognition and emotion are separable, and that an emotion concept is separable from the emotional events that comprise its category (e.g. “fear” is distinct from instances of fear). Over the past several years, research has dissolved these artificial boundaries, suggesting instead that conceptual construction is a domain-general process—a process by which the brain makes meaning of the world. The brain constructs emotion concepts, but also cognitions and perceptions, all in the service of guiding action. In this view, concepts are multimodal constructions, dynamically prepared from a set of highly variable instances. This approach obviates old questions (e.g. how does cognition regulate emotion?) but generates new ones (e.g. how does a brain learn emotion concepts?). In this paper, we review this constructionist, predictive coding account of emotion, considering its implications for health and well-being, culture and development. 相似文献