Clinical features of major depressive disorder in adolescents and their relatives: impact on familial aggregation, implications for phenotype definition, and specificity of transmission

Three questions were addressed using family study data from a community sample: (a) Which clinical features of major depressive disorder (MDD) in adolescents are associated with elevated rates of MDD in relatives? (b) Which features of MDD in relatives distinguish family members of depressed adolescents from relatives of adolescents without mood disorders (NMD)? and (c) Do depressed adolescents with particular features have higher proportions of depressed relatives with the same features? Participants included 268 MDD adolescents, 401 NMD adolescents, and their 2,202 first-degree relatives. Rates of MDD were highest among relatives of depressed adolescents with recurrent episodes and greater impairment. Depression severity best distinguished the relatives of depressed adolescents from relatives of controls. Specific clinical features did not aggregate in families.     

Developmental sequences in the age of onset of disruptive child behaviors

Retrospective and prospective reports of the onset of disruptive child behaviors were analyzed in a sample of clinic-referred boys. The younger boys (ages 7–9 years), compared with the older boys (ages 10–12 years), showed the highest level of disruptive behavior and, judging from mothers' reports, had the fastest progression of onsets from less serious to more serious problem behaviors. Despite some overlap, developmental sequences in problem behavior within the domains of hyperactivity/inattention, oppositional behavior, and conduct problems were similar across the two age groups. This was also the case for developmental sequences of overt or confrontive problem behaviors and covert or concealing conduct problems. Sequences of the onset of oppositional behavior and conduct problems were validated through prospective data, based on the information from mothers, teachers, and boys themselves. The implications of the findings are discussed for the formulation of developmental pathways of behavior and the analysis of causal factors.     

Working memory for movements

Movement to spatial targets that can, in principle, be carried out by more than one effector can be distinguished from movements that involve specific configurations of body parts. The experiments reported here investigate memory span for a series of hand configurations and memory span for a series of hand movements to spatial locations. Spans were produced normally, or in conditions in which a suppression task was carried out on the right or the left hand while the movements to be remembered were presented. All movements were recalled using the right hand. There were two suppression tasks. One involved repeatedly squeezing a tube and so changing the configuration of the hand, and the other involved tapping a repeated series of spatial targets. The spatial tapping task interfered with span for spatial locations when it was presented on either the right or the left hand but did not affect span for movement pattern. The movement suppression task interfered with memory for movement pattern when it was presented on either the right or the left hand, but did not interfere with span for spatial locations. It is concluded that memory for movement configurations involves different processes from those used in spatial tasks and that there may be a need for a subsystem of working memory that is specific for movement configuration.     

Potential for Suicide and Aggression in Delinquents at Juvenile Court in a Southern City

Because juvenile delinquents rarely communicate their wishes for suicide or homicide appropriately to busy caretakers, some means to identify those juveniles at greatest risk of acting out was sought. Psychological examiners in a Southern city individually questioned 263 Juvenile Court offenders about whether they wished to be dead, to kill themselves, or to kill others; and also about their existential experiences, thoughts and feelings. Taking the data associated with each wish, we used stepwise multiple logistic regression to pinpoint experiences, such as substance abuse, that were associated with a high likelihood of verbalizing a wish for destructive behavior. These results included sexual abuse as a risk factor and the presence of a mother or grandmother as a protective factor, and led to recommending education of caretakers and forming a screening test.     

A framework for understanding the allocation of attention in location-precued discrimination

The effects of attention on visual perception are assessed in the location-precuing paradigm. First, we present a review of some current metaphors for attention and relevant data. Then, a framework is suggested that provides an interpretation of the temporal sequence of external and assumed internal processes within a location-cuing trial. Cases when a precue correctly indicates the target location (valid trials) are compared to cases when the precue directs attention to the wrong location (invalid trials) with the cue location either at fixation or peripheral to the target location. Several specific hypotheses are suggested; these concern decrements in performance on invalid trials and effects of the location of a precue. For the most part, these hypotheses are supported by data in the literature and in some new studies. A gradient-filter metaphor for attention, which includes a synthesis of ideas from the gradient model and the attention gate model, is more consistent with the data than is a spotlight metaphor.     

Effects of a Parenting Intervention on Features of Psychopathy in Children

This study examined whether Project Support, a parenting intervention shown to reduce child conduct problems, also exerts positive effects on features of psychopathy in children. Participants were 66 families (mothers and children) recruited from domestic violence shelters who participated in a randomized controlled trial evaluating Project Support. Each family included at least one child between the ages of 4 and 9 who was exhibiting clinical levels of conduct problems. Families were randomly assigned to the Project Support intervention condition or to an existing services comparison condition, and they were assessed on 6 occasions over 20 months, following their departure from the shelter. Children in families in the Project Support condition, compared with those in the comparison condition, exhibited greater reductions in features of psychopathy. Moreover, the changes in features of psychopathy remained after accounting for changes in conduct problems. Project Support’s effects on features of psychopathy were mediated by improvements in mothers’ harsh and inconsistent parenting. These findings on the effects of an intervention on features of psychopathy are the first from a randomized controlled trial. They inform the debate about whether features of psychopathy in children are responsive to intervention, and hold important implications for clinical practice.     

Maternal depression and its relationship to life stress,perceptions of child behavior problems,parenting behaviors,and child conduct problems

This study examined the relationship of reported maternal depression to prior and current life stressors, and to mother perceptions of child adjustment, parenting behaviors, and child conduct problems. Forty-six depressed mothers and 49 nondepressed mothers and their clinic-referred children (aged 3-8 years) participated. Depressed mothers were more critical than nondepressed mothers, but the behavior of children of depressed and nondepressed mothers showed no significant differences. Depressed mothers were more likely to have experience child abuse, spouse abuse, or more negative life events than nondepressed mothers. Maternal reports of stress related to mother characteristics and to negative life events were the most potent variables discriminating depressed from nondepressed mother families.