Recent research suggests a significant relationship between verbal short-term memory and normal language development. Although poor short-term memory and impaired language are features of Down syndrome there has been little investigation of the relationship between these functions in this population, and no studies have included the nonword repetition test devised by Gathercole and Baddeley on which much of the evidence from normal development is based. This study reports the use of nonword repetition with 33 children and teenagers with Down syndrome aged from 5 to 18 years, and investigates the relationship between this test and other memory and language measures. Word repetition was included as an indirect control for the perceptual and speech impairments often associated with this group. Words were repeated significantly more successfully than nonwords and both these tasks were sensitive to word length. Nonword repetition was significantly correlated with age, and when age and nonverbal cognitive ability were controlled, nonword repetition was significantly correlated with all other language-based memory measures, i.e. auditory digit span, word span, sentence repetition, and fluency, and also with memory for a sequence of hand movements, but not with memory for faces or a visual digit span task. There was also a significant relationship between nonword repetition and receptive vocabulary, language comprehension, and reading. When performance on the word repetition task was controlled in addition to age and nonverbal ability, significant correlations between nonword repetition and word span, sentence memory, hand movements, language comprehension, and reading remained. Fewer relationships between auditory digit span and these other measures were established; in particular, there was no association between digit span and the language and reading measures. Results suggest that nonword repetition is a reliable measure of phonological memory in Down syndrome and can predict language comprehension and reading ability.

Research on the role of parenting styles in the development of disruptive behaviour problems has focused primarily on how parents handle conflict once it has occurred. This home observational study examined strategies used by 52 mothers to prevent conflict with 3-year-olds. It was predicted that mothers of children with behaviour problems would use fewer “positive” strategies to resolve conflict, and would use reactive rather than pre-emptive strategies. Results showed frequency of positive strategies did not differ between the groups. Mothers of children with behaviour problems were less likely to use pre-emptive, and more likely to use reactive, strategies. Further analysis showed child conduct problems, rather than other characteristics, best discriminated pre-emptive from reactive strategy users. Follow-up of a subsample found that reactive strategies at age 3 predicted age 5 behaviour problems, even after controlling for age 3 behaviour problems.

This study employed the self-understanding interview of Damon and Hart (1988) to assess the self-concepts of two groups of children and adolescents: a group of individuals with autism and a group of nonautistic mentally retarded individuals who were matched for age and for verbal ability. On the basis of an hypothesis concerning the interpersonal origins of social and psychological self-concepts (Hobson, 1990; Neisser, 1988), it was predicted that the participants with autism would show a relative dearth of such concepts in their talk about themselves. In accordance with our predictions, there was a significant group difference in the number and quality of statements that fell into the social category of self-concept; contrary to our predictions, however, there was no group difference in the number of statements that fell into the psychological category. In addition, although there were not significant group differences in the overall production of verbally expressed concepts concerning self-attributes of a physical, active, or psychological kind, even within these categories individuals with autism made fewer references to social interactions or qualities. These results are discussed with regard to theories of self-concept development in typically developing as well as autistic and mentally retarded individuals, and with reference to the limitations of interpersonal understanding (“theory of mind”) in people with autism.

The literature on the long-term sequelae of sexual and physical abuse is reviewed. Abused children are at risk of long-term adverse psychological sequelae related to the abuse per se and not just as a consequence of other associated background factors. There is some specificity relating the type of psychological outcome to the type of abuse experienced. Physical abuse is just as traumagenic as sexual abuse in the long-term. Whatever the efficacy of specific psychological treatments, there are broad general service measures that will prevent both abuse and re-abuse and therefore impact on long-term sequelae. The studies on the effectiveness of intervention to prevent psychological sequelae of abuse are systematically appraised. There are few well-conducted and adequately controlled studies of the efficacy of treatment for abused children. Where a corpus of studies does exist, e.g. group therapy for sexually abused children, treatment for abused children appears to be as effective for children whose problems arise from other causes. Studies have also shown that abusive parenting can be changed by training.

The Tower of Hanoi (ToH) task was given to 238 children aged from 7 to 15 years, and 20 adults. Individual variation within an age band was substantial. ToH score did not correlate significantly with Verbal IQ, nor with ability to inhibit a prepotent response. We readministered the ToH to 45 children after 30 to 40 days. The test-retest correlation of ·5 is low in relation to accepted psychometric standards, though at least as high as reliability of the related Tower of London (ToL) in adults. The reasons for low reliability remain unclear; task novelty did not seem to be involved, as children did not improve on retest. We conclude that it is not safe to use this test to index integrity or maturation of underlying neurological systems in children. We compared our results with three published studies using the ToL with children, and found similar levels of performance on problems involving the same number of moves. Another study using automated ToL obtained much poorer scores, suggesting that computerised presentation may impair children's performance.

We tested a model of prosocial development, which predicted that prosocial action might decline, not increase, throughout childhood, becoming increasingly selective, individual, gender-related, and linked to emotional dysregulation. Sixty-six focal children at 18, 24, or 30 months of age were observed at home with familiar peers and then again 6 months later. Episodes of peer interaction were analysed for instances of sharing. The predicted decline in sharing with age was qualified by cohort differences and many associations with gender. Most children shared less as they grew older, but the oldest girls slightly increased their rate of sharing over time. As peer relationships developed, girls were more likely to share with other girls; boys were more likely to show reciprocity in sharing. Individual differences in sharing were moderately stable over time and linked to another form of prosocial action, sensitivity to the peer's distress. As predicted, children who shared at higher rates were rated more negatively by their mothers. The positive relationship between prosocial action and mothers' ratings of negative personality traits was especially strong for boys.

The present study examined psychiatric functioning in a community sample of adolescents aged 14 to 17 years (average age of 15 years). We administered the Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children-2·25 (DISC-2·25) to 1201 adolescents and their mothers to obtain prevalence estimates of DSM-III-R disorders and the amount of perceived impairment associated with these disorders. While adolescent females reported a significantly higher prevalence of psychiatric disorders than males (15·5% vs. 8·5%), mothers indicated no sex difference. Compared with adolescent males, females had significantly higher rates of internalizing, anxiety, and depressive disorders. In contrast, the prevalence of externalizing disorders was significantly higher among adolescent males. The inclusion of an impairment criterion had a significant impact in reducing the prevalence rates of overall psychiatric disorders. This reduction occurred mainly through impairment's effects on internalizing disorders, specifically anxiety-based disorders (i.e., simple and social phobia). Given the limited research on the effect of impairment on the prevalence of adolescent psychiatric disorders, future work in this area seems warranted.

The developmental disorders of childhood — autistic, developmental language, reading (dyslexia), and attention deficit-hyperactivity disorders — manifest with deficits in the traditional behavioral domains of cognition, language, visual-spatial function, attention, and socialization. However, none of these disorders has been associated with characteristic discrete focal lesions or recognized encephaloclastic processes. Developmental cognitive neuroscientists must therefore begin with the spectrum of sometimes divergent behaviors occurring within these disorders and work backward in an attempt to identify the responsible anomalous neural systems. Since the advent of “brain imaging” two decades ago, much effort has focused on identifying brain-behavior correlates in these disorders. The results of these neuropathologic, structural, and functional neuroimaging studies are presented and the reasons for the often divergent findings are discussed. As we approach the end of the Decade of the Brain, current neuroimaging techniques give us the technology for the first time to apply a fundamental cognitive approach to brain-behavior relationships in the developmental disorders, to eliminate the conglomeration of “apples and camels” phenomenon. Researchers are working together to create comparable protocols and to adhere to methods that can be replicated across sites. The future prospects for a greater understanding of the developmental disorders are now much brighter with neuroimaging technology.

This paper examines the extent to which conduct problems at age 13 are associated with a range of educational, psychosocial, and sexual outcomes at age 18 in a birth cohort of 488 young women. Significant associations were found between early adolescent conduct problems and later risks of educational failure, juvenile crime, substance abuse, mental health problems, and adverse sexual outcomes by late adolescence. These elevated risks were explained, in part, by social, family, and personal disadvantages associated with adjustment at age 13. In addition, there was evidence of a causal chain process in which early adolescent conduct problems were associated with a series of adolescent risk-taking behaviours, including delinquent peer affiliations, early-onset sexual behaviour, substance use, and school problems that were, in turn, associated with increased risks of later adverse outcomes.

This study examined central inhibitory function in children with Tourette syndrome (TS; N=46) and normally developing controls (N=22) matched on age, gender, and IQ. A negative priming task measured the ability to inhibit processing of irrelevant distractor stimuli presented on a visual display. Initial analyses indicated that participants with Tourette syndrome did not differ significantly in inhibitory function from controls. However, when the large Tourette syndrome sample was separated into subgroups, one without evidence of comorbidity (N=23) and the other meeting research criteria for either AD/HD, OCD, or both (N=23), it became evident that individuals with Tourette syndrome with comorbid conditions tended to perform less well than the control group, whereas those without comorbidity performed much like controls. Similarly, when the large Tourette syndrome sample was divided into two subgroups on the basis of severity of symptomatology (N=23 in each), those with more numerous and severe symptoms of Tourette syndrome, AD/HD, and OCD performed significantly less well than both controls and Tourette syndrome subjects with fewer and less severe symptoms. This suggests that neuropsychological impairment occurs as a function of comorbidity and symptom severity in Tourette syndrome. It also suggests that categorical diagnoses alone may be less useful than dimensional methods for predicting cognitive impairment in individuals with Tourette syndrome.

Adolescent substance abuse, with its heterogeneity, its complexity and its association with behavioural, physical and mental health problems is of increasing interest to many; the politician, the economist, clinicians and researchers, families and young people themselves. Data concerning the prevalence and trends in use of a range of substances in different countries, cultures and different groups are reviewed. The influence of associated mental and physical health problems, the multiple definitions applied to use and abuse and the confounding effect of different ideologies and cultural differences are considered. There is now much interest in the understanding of risk and protective influences, including multi focused prevention programmes among vulnerable young people. Some positive effects of universal prevention programmes are reported, although too often they lack thoroughness in programme implementation, data collection and follow up. Indeed compared to the adult addiction literature there is a death of research on adolescent treatment outcomes. Research needs to address treatment and cost effectiveness in different settings with different groups. The evidence tends to support multi faceted interventions for high risk youths. However, the use of evidence based programmes with a scientific basis should be supported and implemented.

The main aim of the present study was to compare pictures and words with respect to access to semantic systems in autism using a semantic priming paradigm. A word completion task was conducted using both within-modality (word–word, WW) and cross-modality (picture–word, PW) conditions on a group of high-functioning adolescents and adults with autism (N = 20) and a control group (N = 20) matched on chronological age, mental age, Verbal IQ and Performance IQ. Both groups showed semantic priming effects in both modality conditions, generating significantly more responses for related prime-target pairs than for unrelated pairs. Although the control group performed similarly on both priming tasks, the autistic group performed significantly better on a PW task than on a WW task. These findings suggest the possible advantage of pictures over words in access to semantics in autism. The theoretical implications are discussed in terms of functional asymmetry between verbal and pictorial semantic operations that may be specific to autism.

Children's judgements about pain at age 8–10 years were examined comparing two groups of children who had experienced different exposure to nociceptive procedures in the neonatal period: extremely low birthweight (ELBW) [les ]1000 g (N=47) and full birthweight (FBW) [ges ]2500 g (N=37). The 24 pictures that comprise the Pediatric Pain Inventory, depicting events in four settings: medical, recreational, daily living, and psychosocial, were used as the pain stimuli. The subjects rated pain intensity using the Color Analog Scale and pain affect using the Facial Affective Scale. Child IQ and maternal education were statistically adjusted in group comparisons. Pain intensity and pain affect related to activities of daily living and recreation were significantly higher than psychosocial and medically related pain on both scales in both groups of children. Although the two groups of children did not differ overall in their perceptions of pain intensity or affect, the ELBW children rated medical pain intensity significantly higher than psychosocial pain, unlike the FBW group. Also, duration of neonatal intensive care unit stay for the ELBW children was related to increased pain affect ratings in recreational and daily living settings. Despite altered response to pain in the early years reported by parents, on the whole at 8–10 years of age ELBW children judged pain in pictures similarly to their term peers. However, differences were evident, which suggests that studies are needed of biobehavioural reactivity to pain beyond infancy, as well as research into beliefs, attitudes, and perceptions about pain during the course of childhood in formerly ELBW children.

Inpatient care is expensive and should ideally be provided for children and adolescents with the most serious psychiatric disorders. However, only little is known about inpatient treatment, e.g. the factors influencing hospital admission, the content of care in the hospital, the appropriate norms for the duration of inpatient stays, the inpatient arrangements that result in the best outcomes, or connection with necessary aftercare services. There are many methodological problems with existing research. However, it can cautiously be concluded that psychiatric hospitalisation of children and adolescents is often beneficial, particularly if special aspects of treatment are fulfilled (e.g. good therapeutic alliance, treatment with a cognitive-based problem-solving skills training package, or planned discharge) and aftercare services are available. The continuum-of-care model is promising because it provides opportunities to achieve better integration between inpatient interventions and aftercare services.

Phonological awareness is important for reading development in hearing children, in whom it develops at the three consecutive levels of the syllable, rhyme, and phoneme. Deaf children typically have literacy difficulties, and previous research has been equivocal about whether deaf children can develop phonological awareness. Three experiments are presented that investigate the phonological skills of deaf children (mean age 11 years) at the three linguistic levels of syllable, rhyme, and phoneme. The first experiment showed that deaf children's syllable awareness can be equivalent to that of chronological age-matched hearing controls. In the second experiment, deaf children's ability to make rhyme judgements was above chance, but poorer than that of younger reading-matched hearing controls. The third experiment showed that deaf children could phonologically recode nonsense words at a level above chance, suggesting that they could draw on phonemic skills in certain conditions. We conclude that deaf children can develop phonological awareness, but that their phonological skills lag those of hearing children and may develop in different ways. Differences between our tasks and those used in other studies are discussed.

The efficacy of cognitive-behavioral treatment (CBT) and fire safety education (FSE) for children who had set a recent fire was evaluated. Assessments were conducted with 38 children who were randomly assigned to CBT or FSE and with another 16 children who received a brief intervention (home visit from a firefighter or HVF) that paralleled routine services. Measures in four domains related to the child's fire history were obtained from children and their parents at pre-treatment, post-assessment, and 1-year follow-up. There were several improvements at post-treatment for all conditions on measures of fire involvement, interest, and risk. However, CBT and FSE were more efficacious than HVF on certain measures, including the frequency of firesetting and proportion of children playing with matches, severity of individualized problems with fire, and involvement in fire-related acts and other deviant fire activities. These and other group differences, along with certain time effects, were evident at 1-year follow-up. The findings from this initial comparison study are discussed in the context of needed clinical and research directions for work with firesetters and their families.

This paper reports the results of cognitive, linguistic, and academic assessments in a representative sample of 62 adults with Williams syndrome. The average age of the group was 26 years and their mean full scale IQ was 61. Differences between Verbal and Performance IQ, and between receptive and expressive language skills, were smaller than generally found in studies of children with this condition. However, an examination of subtest scores revealed an almost identical cognitive profile to that found in children. Skills in other areas, such as reading, spelling, arithmetic, and social adaptation remained at a low level, with functioning generally being around a 6–8-year age equivalent. The consistency of reports on intellectual abilities in both child and adult studies of individuals with Williams syndrome lends increased support to the notion of a syndrome specific pattern of cognitive, linguistic, and adaptive functioning.

Abbreviations: BPVS: British Picture Vocabulary Scale; EOWVT: Expressive One Word Vocabulary Test; WAIS-R: Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale–Revised; WISC (-R): Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (Revised); WORD: Wechsler Objective Reading Dimensions (WORD).

This study examined whether the link between marital conflict management style and child conduct problems with peers and parents is direct or mediated by mothers' and fathers' parenting style (critical parenting and low emotional responsivity). One hundred and twenty children, aged 4 to 7 years, were observed interacting in our laboratory playroom solving a problem with their best friend as well as at home with their parents. In addition, all the children's parents were observed in our laboratory trying to solve two family problems as well as at home interacting under more natural conditions with each other and with their children. Mothers and fathers completed questionnaires assessing marital problem solving as well as reports of their children's behavior problems. Results indicated that a negative marital conflict management style had direct links with children's conduct problems. In addition, the linkage between negative marital conflict management and children's interactions with parents and peers was found to be mediated by both mothers' and fathers' critical parenting and low emotional responsivity, thereby supporting the indirect as well as the direct model of negative family interactions. The findings are discussed in relation to the implications for treatment.

Using data from the Montreal Longitudinal-Experimental Study, we examined the impact of poverty (and its correlate, family configuration status) on academic placement and self-reported delinquency in boys at age 16. We then investigated whether the relation between family economic hardship and antisocial behaviour is direct or indirect by considering the value of parenting practices and academic failure as process variables in the model. Data included official records, and parent, teacher, and self-reports. The temporal intensity of poverty was classified into five categories: never-poor; always-poor; poor-earlier; poor-later; and transitory-poverty. Family configuration status was classified by both temporal characteristics and number of marital transitions: intact-family; short-term-single; long-term-single; short-term-remarried; long-term-remarried; and multiple-marital-transitions. Results revealed that when maternal education and early childhood behaviour were controlled, poverty had an effect on both academic failure and extreme delinquency. This effect was independent of family configuration status. Although they both significantly predicted extreme delinquency on their own, academic failure and parental supervision did not mediate the relationship between poverty and delinquency. Divorce increased the risk of theft and fighting at age 16, regardless of financial hardship. Parental supervision only helped explain the effects of divorce on boys' fighting.

Expressed Emotion (EE), a measure of the emotional climate of the family, predicts subsequent adjustment of adults with mental disorder (Leff & Vaughn, 1985). Despite the acknowledged importance of the family in childhood disorders, there have been relatively few studies of expressed emotion with adolescents and school-aged children and virtually none focused on preschoolers. The present study utilized the Five Minute Speech Sample (FMSS) to examine how Expressed Emotion relates concurrently and longitudinally to child problem status in a community sample of 112 preschool-aged children. At preschool, the proportion of high EE increased significantly across three child groups: Comparison (8.1%), Borderline Problem (15.8%), and High Problem (41.2%); however, preschool EE was not predictive of subsequent child status at 1st grade. Expanded FMSS codes, tapping positive affect and worry about the child, were also related to child problem group at preschool and were predictive of subsequent child status at 1st grade. Because parents' stress and adjustment were also highly related to child problem group status, we examined whether the FMSS codes were essentially a proxy for these or whether they explained unique variance. In two stepwise regressions on preschool child group status (divided by total problems and by externalizing problems), maternal stress was the only variable to enter. Also, in predicting to 1st grade externalizing child group status, only maternal stress entered. Discussion focused on the extension of the EE construct and other FMSS coding to young children, and the need to recognize that to some extent these variables may reflect maternal stress and adjustment.