Why do depressive symptoms increase during adolescence? Because inhibition and poor peer relationships predict adolescents' depressive symptoms concurrently, we hypothesized that adolescents who cope with the stresses of this period by becoming increasingly inhibited may experience increasing depressive symptoms both directly and due to increased difficulty with peers. Longitudinal data from 904 participants, (52% female; 87% Caucasian, 5% Hispanic, 4% African-American, 4.6% other) from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care were examined when youth were in sixth and ninth grades. Path analyses revealed a direct effect of inhibition: Youth who became more inhibited reported increasing depressive symptoms. Indirect effects showed that they also experienced declines in friendship quality and popularity, which in turn led to increases in depressive symptoms. Findings suggest that increasing inhibition as an adaptation to the stresses of adolescence, and particularly its impact on popularity, is a risk factor for increases in depressive symptoms.

Despite considerable research on why antisocial behavior develops and interventions that reduce it, aspects of everyday family processes that may promote naturally occurring declines in antisocial behavior or that may result from such declines in most children without intervention are poorly understood. The current study explored family processes that may enable children to replace antisocial tendencies and the effects that declines in antisocial behavior may have on parenting and child regulatory processes. Longitudinal data from 1,022 children (54 months-6th grade) from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development were examined. Findings demonstrated that naturally occurring declines in antisocial behavior both predicted and were predicted by maternal sensitivity, emotion regulation, and social skills. These declines predicted but were not predicted by declines in hostile attributions. The data revealed multiple indirect paths, which highlight the complex nature of these variables across development.

Psychopathic traits reflect deficits in behavioral, affective, and interpersonal functioning (Cooke & Michie, 2001). Children with poor inhibitory control may display these traits. Maternal sensitivity and attachment have been implicated in psychopathic traits, but whether they may reduce the likelihood of psychopathic trait expression in adolescence for uninhibited children is largely unknown. The current study attempted to shed light on this issue. Data came from 957 adolescents, followed from 54 months through 15 years. Findings demonstrated that maternal sensitivity was associated with a reduced likelihood of psychopathic traits for males with low inhibitory control. For females, secure attachment mediated the interaction of sensitivity and inhibitory control to psychopathic traits. The current study offers insight into the temperamental traits, parenting, and relational processes involved in psychopathic trait expression during adolescence.

This review examines why, without clinical intervention, antisocial behavior tends toAntisocial behavior is disordered conduct that creates serious problems for individuals, families, schools, and society. It is associated with violence, drug abuse, academic failure, and

Individuals differ in their tendencies to approach or avoid social interaction and social relationships. Some seek social contact. They take social initiative, communicate easily and openly, experience pleasure during social interaction, and form close personal ties. Others shy away from social contact. They can be withdrawn and passive, communicate less, experience anxiety in social situations, and fail to maintain close personal ties. These differences have important consequences. As a general rule, happiness and adjustment are better when people are motivated to approach social interaction, worse when they are motivated to avoid it (Baumeister & Leary, 1995;Gable, 2006). Where do these differences come from? In this chapter, we argue that parentchild interaction in the first 2 to 3 years of life may play an initial formative role. We evaluate the interactions that may be critical and the processes that may stabilize children's early approach and avoidance tendencies. Our analysis emphasizes the complex interplay between genes and environments as very young children begin to construct representations of their affective experiences with others, particularly parents.