Visual recognition memory: a predictor of later cognitive functioning in preterms

A number of preterms who had participated in a study of visual recognition memory when they were 6 months of age were seen at older ages to assess the predictive validity of the early visual measures for cognitive outcome. The Bayley scales were administered at 6, 12, and 24 months, the Stanford-Binet at 34 and 40 months, and the WISC-R at 6 years. Novelty scores, which reflect the relative amount of time infants look at new compared to familiar stimuli, constituted the measure of infant visual processing. These scores, obtained by averaging over performance on the 3 or 4 problems administered at 6 months of age, were consistently and significantly related to cognitive measures from 24 months to 6 years, with correlations ranging from r = .53 to r = .66. Parental education, which was unrelated to novelty scores, bore a strong relationship to outcome beginning at 24 months. Although both measures contributed uniquely to the variance in cognitive outcome at 24 months and 6 years, visual novelty scores made a stronger contribution than did parental education. Neither 6- nor 12-month Bayley scores, nor various perinatal variables, were related to outcome.     

Mother-child interaction at age two years and perceived difficult temperament

The current study investigated a hypothesized link between early child temperament and later problem behavior. Early temperament was assessed at ages 6, 13, and 24 months via mother ratings on age-appropriate versions of the Infant Characteristics Questionnaire. The 24-month form was developed in this study. Factor analyses of the questionnaire indicated a clear difficultness factor that was similar in content across all 3 ages. The 6-, 13-, and 24-month difficultness factors were correlated with home observation measures of mother-toddler interaction at age 24 months. Home observation indexes focused on situations where the mother tried to control the toddler's "trouble" behavior. Children rated by their mothers as difficult at 24 months were found to approach "mild trouble" more frequently than children perceived as easy or average. Furthermore, their mothers used intrusive control tactics more frequently than mothers of easy or average children. Analysis of behavior sequence variables showed that difficult children resisted their mothers' control attempts significantly more often than easy or average children, that is, had more conflict with the mothers. The 6- and 13-month difficultness scores predicted both the 2-year-old difficultness rating and the observed conflict indexes. It is suggested that the conflict observed in the interaction between the difficult 2-year-olds and their mothers is conceptually similar to the conflictual behavior characteristic of older, clinically referred, socially aggressive children and their mothers. Thus, the conflicted interactions found at age 2 years may represent an empirically based link between difficult infant temperament and the development of childhood problem behavior.     

Cumulative environmental risk in substance abusing women: early intervention, parenting stress, child abuse potential and child development

OBJECTIVE: To assess the relationship between cumulative environmental risks and early intervention, parenting attitudes, potential for child abuse and child development in substance abusing mothers. METHOD: We studied 161 substance-abusing women, from a randomized longitudinal study of a home based early intervention, who had custody of their children through 18 months. The intervention group received weekly home visits in the first 6 months and biweekly visits from 6 to 18 months. Parenting stress and child abuse potential were assessed at 6 and 18 months postpartum. Children's mental and motor development (Bayley MDI and PDI) and language development (REEL) were assessed at 6, 12, and 18 months postpartum. Ten maternal risk factors were assessed: maternal depression, domestic violence, nondomestic violence, family size, incarceration, no significant other in home, negative life events, psychiatric problems, homelessness, and severity of drug use. Level of risk was recoded into four categories (2 or less, 3, 4, and 5 or more), which had adequate cell sizes for repeated measures analysis. DATA ANALYSIS: Repeated measures analyses were run to examine how level of risk and group (intervention or control) were related to parenting stress, child abuse potential, and children's mental, motor and language development over time. RESULTS: Parenting stress and child abuse potential were higher for women with five risks or more compared with women who had four or fewer risks; children's mental, motor, and language development were not related to level of risk. Children in the intervention group had significantly higher scores on the PDI at 6 and 18 months (107.4 vs. 103.6 and 101.1 vs. 97.2) and had marginally better scores on the MDI at 6 and 12 months (107.7 vs. 104.2 and 103.6 vs. 100.1), compared to the control group. CONCLUSION: Compared to drug-abusing women with fewer than five risks, women with five or more risks found parenting more stressful and indicated greater inclination towards abusive and neglectful behavior, placing their infants at increased risk for poor parenting, abuse and neglect. Early home-based intervention in high-risk families may be beneficial to infant development.     

Infant-mother face-to-face interaction: age and gender differences in coordination and the occurrence of miscoordination

To evaluate the extent to which infants and mothers are able to coordinate their behavior, the interactions of 54 mother-infant pairs--18 each at 3, 6, and 9 months of age--were videotaped. Coordination was evaluated with 2 measures: (1) matching--the extent to which mother and infant engage in the same behavior at the same time; and (2) synchrony--the extent to which mother and infant change their behavior with respect to one another. Mother-infant pairs increase their degree of coordination with infant age, but the proportion of time they are coordinated is small. Mother-son pairs spend more time in coordinated states than mother-daughter pairs. The results suggest that interactions be characterized in terms of their movement from coordinated to miscoordinated states rather than only in terms of their degree of coordination. The gender differences are discussed in terms of their importance for the developmental differences in females and males.     

Longitudinal predictors of developmental status and social interaction in premature and full-term infants at age two

This investigation involved the longitudinal assessment of 30 mother-preterm and 40 mother-full-term dyads from birth to 2 years of age. Measures of maternal attitudes, maternal perception of the infant, and parental functioning were obtained at 1 and 8 months of infant age. Mother-infant interactions were observed at 4, 8, 12, and 24 months. Infant cognitive, motor, and language development was assessed at 4, 12, and 24 months. Results indicated that by age 2 years, no group differences were apparent on any child development, mother-child interaction, or maternal attitudinal measures; the lone exception was that preterms were significantly poorer in motor skills. This similarity in functioning at age 2 years was in marked contrast to earlier findings of major group differences at 12 months. Correlational and regression analyses indicated that the developmental and social interaction outcomes were predicted by different factors in the two groups; moreover, whereas 40%-60% of the variance in preterm infants' social and cognitive outcomes could be accounted for, only 15%-30% was accounted for in the full-term group. These results are discussed in terms of compensatory mechanisms that may characterize the parenting of high-risk infants, and of the applicability of transactional models of development.     

Attachment for Infants in Foster Care: The Role of Caregiver State of Mind

The concordance between foster mothers' attachment state of mind and foster infants' attachment quality was examined for 50 foster mother-infant dyads. Babies had been placed into the care of their foster mothers between birth and 20 months of age. Attachment quality was assessed between 12 and 24 months of age, at least 3 months after the infants' placement into foster care. The two-way correspondence between maternal state of mind and infant attachment quality was 72%, kappa = .43, similar to the level seen among biologically intact mother-infant dyads. Contrary to expectations, age at placement was not related to attachment quality. Rather, concordance between maternal state of mind and infant attachment was seen for relatively late-placed babies, as well as early placed babies. These findings have two major implications. First, following a disruption in care during the first year and a half of life, babies appear capable of organizing their behavior around the availability of new caregivers. Second, these data argue for a nongenetic mechanism for the intergenerational transmission of attachment.     

Disorganized Infant Attachment Classification and Maternal Psychosocial Problems as Predictors of Hostile-Aggressive Behavior in the Preschool Classroom

This study of 62 lowincome families examined the relation between maternal and infant measures assessed at 18 months infant age and child behavior problems at age 5 as rated by preschool teachers. The infancy assessments included measures of mother-infant interaction, maternal psychosocial problems, infant cognitive development, and infant attachment security, including the disorganized/disoriented classification. The strongest single predictor of deviant levels of hostile behavior toward peers in the classroom was earlier disorganized/disoriented attachment status, with 71% of hostile preschoolers classified as disorganized in their attachment relationships in infancy. Maternal psychosocial problems independently predicted hostile aggressions in preschool and combined additively with infant attachment security in prediction. Results are discussed in relation to the asymmetry of forward and backward prediction that characterized the findings and in relation to the potential significance of disorganized attachment behavior as a precursor to later maladaptation.     

Do infants need social cognition to act socially? An alternative look at infant pointing

Tomasello, Carpenter, and Liszkowski (2007) present a comprehensive review of the infant pointing literature. They conclude that infant pointing demonstrates communicative intent from its onset, at about 1 year of age. In this commentary, it is noted that for infants to understand communicative intent, they must have a concept of self and others as intentional agents. Evidence is reviewed to argue that this is not possible until 18-24 months of age. A leaner explanation of how infants might initially succeed in pointing tasks without understanding communicative intent is considered.     

Assessment of Autism Symptoms From 6 to 18 Months of Age Using the Autism Observation Scale for Infants in a Prospective High-Risk Cohort

The objectives were to characterize behavioral signs of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in younger siblings of diagnosed children (high-risk; HR) and examine classification features of the Autism Observation Scale for Infants (AOSI). Participants (501 HR and 180 low-risk [LR]) were assessed between 6 and 18 months using the AOSI and at age 3 for ASD diagnoses. Total AOSI scores differentiated HR infants later diagnosed with ASD starting at 12 months. ROC analyses identified 12- and 18-month cutoff scores associated with 0.52 sensitivity and 0.74 specificity and 0.73 sensitivity and 0.65 specificity, respectively. Although classification accuracy does not support use as a standalone screen, the AOSI identifies features associated with ASD starting at 6 months and differentiates HR infants with ASD by 12 months.     

Parenting and infant difficulty: testing a mutual exacerbation hypothesis to predict early onset conduct problems

The prediction of conduct problems (CPs) from infant difficulty and parenting measured in the first 6 months of life was studied in a sample of 267 high-risk mother-child dyads. Stable, cross-situational CPs at school entry (5-6 years) were predicted by negative infancy parenting, mediated by mutually angry and hostile mother-toddler interactions at 24-42 months. Mother-child interactions late in toddlerhood were especially relevant for CPs. Contrary to predictions, difficult child behavior in the first 6 months of life was not consistently associated with CPs, either independently or in interaction with negative infancy parenting. The findings most strongly highlight the role of negative mothering in early infancy, and of changes in mother-toddler interaction, in early onset CPs.     

Infant joint attention, temperament, and social competence in preschool children

Infant joint attention has been observed to be related to social-emotional outcomes in at-risk children. To address whether this relation is also evident in typically developing children, 52 children were tested at 12, 15, 24, and 30 months to examine associations between infant joint attention and social outcomes. Twelve-month initiating and responding to joint attention were related to 30-month social competence and externalizing behavior, even when accounting for 15-month temperament ratings, 24-month cognition and language, and demographic variables. These results suggest that, in addition to associations with language and cognition, infant joint attention reflects robust aspects of development that are related to individual differences in the emergence of social and behavioral competence in childhood.     

Toys and social interaction between infant peers

Claims that young infants fail to react in a social manner to one another and that toys preempt attention to peers were assessed by comparing the interactions observed between infant peers when they met in the presence of toys versus in their absence. 44 pairs of unacquainted infants (either 10--12 or 22--24 months of age) came with their mothers to an unfamiliar room. Without toys available in the room, infants of both ages more often contacted one another, smiled at and gestured to one another, and duplicated each other's actions. With toys, they showed and exchanged toys and spent more time synchronously manipulating similar play material. The results document that infants as young as 10 months of age are responsive to the person and behavior of an unfamiliar peer and that they are no less responsive than older infants to the social versus nonsocial aspects of a novel setting.     

Biological Sensitivity to the Effects of Maternal Postpartum Depressive Symptoms on Children's Behavior Problems

Resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) may confer infant susceptibility to the postpartum environment. Among infants with higher RSA, there may be a positive relation between depressive symptoms across the first 6 months postpartum (PPD) and later behavior problems, and toddlers’ dysregulation during mother–child interactions may partially explain the effects. Among a sample of low-income Mexican-American families, infant RSA (N = 322; 46% male) was assessed at 6 weeks of age; mothers (M_age = 27.8, SD = 6.5) reported PPD symptoms every 3 weeks from 6 to 24 weeks and infant behavior problems at 36 months. Dysregulation was observed at 24 months. PPD was positively associated with behavior problems only among infants with lower RSA; however, this relation was not mediated by dysregulation.     

Can Infant Temperament Be Used to Predict Which Toddlers Are Likely to Have Increased Emotional and Behavioral Problems?

The 'terrible twos' are often associated with increased temper tantrums, noncompliance and aggression. Although some expression of these behaviors is normal, whether early individual factors can predict which children are most at risk of frequent or prolonged emotional and behavioral problems is of increasing interest. The current study of 6,067 toddlers found that their 9 month scores on a new brief measure of temperament—the Infant Behavior Questionnaire – Revised - Very Short Form (IBQ-R-VSF)—were associated with both difficult behaviors and prosocial behaviors at age 2, measured using a preschool version of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. Controlling for a range of demographic, maternal characteristics and contextual factors, we found that infants higher on the trait Negative Emotionality and/ or lower on Orienting Capacity and Fear were more likely to develop hyperactivity, emotion, peer and conduct problems and less likely to demonstrate pro-social behaviors at two years of age. Temperament aged 9 months explained an additional 1 - 6 % of the variance in toddler behavior. These findings suggest that infant temperament is associated with the behavior strengths and difficulties of 2-year-olds and provide the first longitudinal validation of the new 5-factor structure of the new IBQ-R-VSF.     

Infant Care: Evaluation of Pre-Care Differences Hypotheses

189 infants/toddlers and their parents were visited in their homes 2 weeks before starting an out-of-home care arrangement and followed every two weeks until 6 months after care had begun (or its equivalent for parent care groups). At the beginning of the study infant/toddlers ranged in age from 2 to 30 months. In this report, hypotheses examining the role of pre-care family characteristics in determining child care use and later child adjustment were evaluated. Discriminant function analyses reliably separated care type and age of entry groups using pre-care family and infant characteristics as predictors. There were no significant differences in child behavior problems (externalizing and internalizing behavior) as a function of care arrangement type experienced. Mother's pre-care parent stress (PSI parent domain subscale: attachment to child) predicted anxious/withdrawn behavior 6 months later. Aggressive/destructive behavior was related independently to mother's health status and parent stress (PSI parent domain subscale: sense of competence) as measured before out-of- home care was begun. Difficult temperament infants had more behavior problems of all types.     

Age differences in the reliability of the psychiatric interview of the child

The NIMH Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children, a highly structured interview covering a broad range of clinically relevant symptoms and behaviors, was administered to 242 disturbed children and their parents. Parent and child were interviewed separately and were assessed twice at a median interval of 9 days. Intraclass correlations between symptom scores derived from the interviews indicated that parents were generally more reliable than children in reporting child symptoms. However, test-retest reliabilities showed an opposite age pattern for parent and child. The reliability of the child's report increased with age and was lower for children aged 6-9 than those aged 10-13 and 14-18. Conversely, the reliability of the parent's report decreased with the age of the child and was slightly higher for children aged 6-9 than those aged 10-13 and 14-18. These findings were interpreted in terms of children's cognitive development and age-related shifts in parents' perceptions and awareness of their children's behavior.     

Changes in Cooperation and Self-Other Differentiation during the Second Year

Cooperation in peer interaction emerges during the second half of the second year. A consideration of the skills and knowledge entailed in these early forms of cooperation suggests that young children's emerging ability to differentiate self from other as causal agents may relate to their ability to coordinate behavior with age mates toward a common goal. Children at 12, 18, 24, and 30 months were observed in same-age, same-sex dyads (8 dyads per age) while attempting to solve a simple cooperation problem. They were also individually administered an elicited imitation task used to index decentration, or self-other differentiation. No 12-month-old dyad could cooperate, 18-month-olds did so infrequently and apparently accidentally, whereas 24- and 30-month-olds were able to coordinate behavior with one another quickly and effectively. Children who were better able to accommodate their behavior to one another during cooperation also represented the agency of others at a more advanced, decentered level.     

Childhood history of abuse and child abuse potential in adolescent mothers: a longitudinal study

OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this research was to determine whether adolescent mothers of newborns are at higher risk for child abuse than adult mothers of newborns and to examine whether adolescent mothers with memories of child maltreatment have a higher risk for child abuse. METHOD: Two groups (adolescents and adults) of pregnant mothers were followed for 20 months beginning between the 5th and the 7th month of pregnancy until the child was 18 months old. Adolescent (N = 24) and adult (N = 24) mothers were matched on sociodemographic variables. During pregnancy, memories of child maltreatment were evaluated. When child was 1, 6, 12, and 18 months old, risk for child abuse was evaluated. RESULTS: Adolescent and adult mothers showed no differences in memories of childhood physical or emotional abuse. Nevertheless, adolescent mothers showed higher child abuse potential and depression scores than adult mothers. Mothers with memories of severe physical punishment showed higher child abuse potential scores and mothers with memories of physical punishment producing physical damage showed higher child abuse potential and depression scores. A statistically significant age of the mother by physical punishment producing physical damage interaction was found for depression. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this longitudinal study indicated that the potential for abuse was significantly greater in adolescent mothers than in adult mothers, and in mothers who had been victims of physical abuse than in those who had not. It also appeared that, among adolescent mothers, those who had been victims of childhood physical abuse constitute a higher risk group for child physical abuse.     

The Relations among Infant Temperament, Security of Attachment, and Behavioral Inhibition at Twenty-Four Months

The purpose of this study was to examine the relations among infant temperament, attachment, and behavioral inhibition. 52 infants were seen at 2 days, 5, 14, and 24 months of age. Assessments were made of temperament at 2 days and 5 months of age, and attachment and behavioral inhibition were assessed at 14 and 24 months, respectively. EKG was recorded at each assessment, and measures of heart period and vagal tone were computed. Distress to pacifier withdrawal at 2 days of age was related to insecure attachment at 14 months. 2 types of distress reactivity at 5 months, reactivity to frustration and reactivity to novelty, were identified and related to high vagal tone. Attachment classification at 14 months was directly related to inhibited behavior at 24 months. Infants classified as insecure/resistant were more inhibited than those classified as insecure/avoidant. In addition, an interaction of infant reactivity to frustration and attachment classification was found to predict inhibition at 24 months. Infants classified as insecure/resistant and who had not cried to the arm restraint procedure at 5 months were the most inhibited at 24 months. These findings are discussed in terms of hypotheses regarding multiple modes of distress reactivity and regulation in early infancy and their different social and behavioral outcomes.     

Infant Care: Evaluation of Pre-Care Differences Hypotheses

189 infants/toddlers and their parents were visited in their homes 2 weeks before starting an out-of-home care arrangement and followed every two weeks until 6 months after care had begun (or its equivalent for parent care groups). At the beginning of the study infant/toddlers ranged in age from 2 to 30 months. In this report, hypotheses examining the role of pre-care family characteristics in determining child care use and later child adjustment were evaluated. Discriminant function analyses reliably separated care type and age of entry groups using pre-care family and infant characteristics as predictors. There were no significant differences in child behavior problems (externalizing and internalizing behavior) as a function of care arrangement type experienced. Mother's pre-care parent stress (PSI parent domain subscale: attachment to child) predicted anxious/withdrawn behavior 6 months later. Aggressive/destructive behavior was related independently to mother's health status and parent stress (PSI parent domain subscale: sense of competence) as measured before out-of- home care was begun. Difficult temperament infants had more behavior problems of all types.