Longitudinal Associations Between Reactive and Regulatory Temperament Traits and Depressive Symptoms in Middle Childhood.

Although a large literature has examined the role of temperament in adult and adolescent depression, few studies have investigated interactions between reactive and regulatory temperament traits in shaping depressive symptoms in children over time. Child temperament measures (laboratory observations and maternal reports) and depressive symptoms were collected from 205 seven-year-olds (46% boys), who were followed up 1 (N=181) and 2 (N=171) years later. Child participants were Caucasian (87.80%), Asian (1.95%), or other ethnicity (7.80%); 2.45% of the sample was missing ethnicity data. Multilevel modeling was used to investigate within- and between-person variance in intercepts and slopes of child depressive symptoms. A steeper increase in depressive symptoms was found for children lower in laboratory-assessed effortful control (EC). Lower mother-reported surgency and higher mother-reported NE predicted increases in child depressive symptoms in the context of lower mother-reported EC. Our findings implicate EC as having main and moderating effects related to depressive symptoms in middle childhood. We emphasize the importance of developing prevention programs that enhance EC-like abilities.

Parental depression and child cognitive vulnerability predict children's cortisol reactivity.

Risk for depression is expressed across multiple levels of analysis. For example, parental depression and cognitive vulnerability are known markers of depression risk, but no study has examined their interactive effects on children's cortisol reactivity, a likely mediator of early depression risk. We examined relations across these different levels of vulnerability using cross-sectional and longitudinal methods in two community samples of children. Children were assessed for cognitive vulnerability using self-reports (Study 1; n = 244) and tasks tapping memory and attentional bias (Study 2; n = 205), and their parents were assessed for depression history using structured clinical interviews. In both samples, children participated in standardized stress tasks and cortisol reactivity was assessed. Cross-sectionally and longitudinally, parental depression history and child cognitive vulnerability interacted to predict children's cortisol reactivity; associations between parent depression and elevated child cortisol activity were found when children also showed elevated depressotypic attributions as well as attentional and memory biases. Findings indicate that models of children's emerging depression risk may benefit from the examination of the interactive effects of multiple sources of vulnerability across levels of analysis.

Cognitive vulnerability to depression during middle childhood: Stability and associations with maternal affective styles and parental depression.

Theories of cognitive vulnerability to depression (CVD) imply that CVD is early-emerging and trait-like; however, little longitudinal work has tested this premise in middle childhood, or examined theoretically relevant predictors of child CVD. We examined test-retest correlations of self-referent encoding task performance and self-reported attributional styles and their associations with parental characteristics in 205 seven-year-olds. At baseline, child CVD was assessed, structured clinical interviews were conducted with parents, and ratings of observed maternal affective styles were made. Children's CVD was re-assessed approximately one and two years later. Both measures of children's CVD were prospectively and concurrently associated with children's depressive symptoms and showed modest stability. Multilevel modeling indicated that maternal criticism and paternal depression were related to children's CVD. Findings indicate that even early-emerging CVD is a valid marker of children's depression risk.

Perseveration and the status of 3-year-olds' knowledge in a card-sorting task: evidence from studies involving congruent flankers.

Infants and young children often perseverate despite apparent knowledge of the correct response. Two Experiments addressed questions concerning the status of such knowledge in the context of a card-sorting task. In Experiment 1, three groups of 3-year-olds sorted bivalent cards one way and then were instructed to switch and sort the same cards using new rules under varying conditions of support offered by congruent flankers. Although formal aspects of the task such as higher-order rule use, stimulus redescription, and dimensional shifting remained constant across all conditions, use of the new rules increased with parametric increases in environmental support for the use of the new rules. In Experiment 2, 3-year-olds were more likely to switch and use new rules when test stimuli were flanked by congruent flankers rather than neutral flankers, even though both conditions made equivalent demands on attentional inhibition. Thus, in both experiments, children's knowledge of the new rules proved to be adequate under less demanding conditions but inadequate under more demanding conditions. These findings are consistent with the idea that children's knowledge is graded in strength rather than present or absent.

Flankers facilitate 3-year-olds' performance in a card-sorting task.

Three-year-old children often act inflexibly in card-sorting tasks by continuing to sort by an old rule after being asked to switch and sort by a new rule. This inflexibility has been variously attributed to age-related constraints on higher order rule use, object redescription, and attention shifting. In 2 experiments, flankers that were congruent with the new rule significantly facilitated 3-year-olds' use of the new rule and did so without changing the requirement to use higher order rules, redescribe objects, or shift attention. The results suggest that preschoolers' inflexibility is linked, in part, to the degree of conflict that must be resolved in postswitch trials.

Child temperament and parental depression predict cortisol reactivity to stress in middle childhood.

Children's cortisol reactivity to stress is an important mediator of depression risk, making the search for predictors of such reactivity an important goal for psychopathologists. Multiple studies have linked maternal depression and childhood behavioral inhibition (BI) independently to child cortisol reactivity, yet few have tested multivariate models of these risks. Further, paternal depression and other child temperament traits, such as positive emotionality (PE), have been largely ignored despite their potential relevance. We therefore examined longitudinal associations between child fear/BI and PE and parental depression, and children's cortisol stress reactivity, in 205 7-year-olds. Paternal depression and child fear/BI predicted greater cortisol stress reactivity at a follow-up of 164 9-year-olds, and maternal depression and child PE interacted to predict children's cortisol reactivity, such that higher child PE predicted lower cortisol reactivity in the context of maternal depression. Results highlight the importance of both parents' depression, as well as multiple facets of child temperament, in developing more comprehensive models of childhood cortisol reactivity to stress.

Structure of observed temperament in middle childhood.

Although much is known about the structure of adult temperament and personality, significantly less is known about the structure of child temperament. We examined the structure of child temperament in 205 seven-year-olds using observational measures. Exploratory factor analysis identified factors representing positive emotionality/sociability, disinhibition/anger, fear/behavioral inhibition, and sadness. The predictive validity of these dimensions was evaluated by examining their associations with children's internalizing and externalizing symptoms: positive emotionality/sociability showed positive associations with ADHD symptoms, disinhibition/anger showed positive associations with externalizing symptoms, fear/behavioral inhibition showed negative associations with ADHD and CD symptoms, and sadness showed positive associations with both internalizing and externalizing problems. These associations were consistent with extant literature on temperament and psychopathology, supporting the validity of the structure obtained.