Assessing Unpredictability in Caregiver-Child Relationships: Insights from Theoretical and Empirical Perspectives

Abstract

There has been significant interest and progress in understanding the role of caregiver-child unpredictability on brain maturation, cognitive and socioemotional development, and psychopathology. Theoretical consensus has emerged about its unique influence in shaping children’s experience, distinct from other adverse exposures or features of stress exposure. Nonetheless, the field still lacks theoretical and empirical common ground due to difficulties in accurately operationalizing and measuring unpredictability. In this paper, we first provide a historical overview of unpredictability and present four issues that are currently under-discussed but are crucial to the field. Focusing on how moment-to-moment and day-to-day dynamics are at the heart of caregiver unpredictability, we review three approaches aiming to address some of these nuances: dynamic systems, environmental statistics, and entropy. Lastly, we conclude with a broad summary and suggest future research directions. Systematic progress in this field can inform interventions and policies aiming to increase stability in the lives of children.

What’s Next? Advances and Challenges in Understanding How Environmental Predictability Shapes the Development of Cognitive Control

“…For example, some households may be structured in ways that make it harder for developing children to assess future events or outcomes because of irregular routines (e.g., no morning routines, family plans rarely work out, inconsistent disciplines), disorganized environments (e.g., high levels of commotion inside the home, difficulty finding things when needed), high household transience (e.g., frequently moving residence, people coming and leaving, irregular personal relationships), inconsistency in parental mood, and inconsistent safety and security (e.g., food or financial insecurity, not feeling safe at home). More predictable environments appear to support multiple facets of brain and cognitive development (Ugarte & Hastings, 2023). For example, greater exposure to predictable routines (e.g., eating meals as a family, consistent bedtimes) during adolescence predicts higher adult levels of cognitive control—processes that regulate thoughts, actions, and emotions in support of flexible, goal-directed behavior (Andrews et al, 2021).…”

“…Measurements of unpredictability vary across studies and fields (e.g., assessing aspects of the environment vs. perceptions of unpredictability, via questionnaires vs. behavioral coding, measured retrospectively vs. prospectively), and it is unclear how these measures relate to one another (Young et al, 2020) and how such relationships might vary across timescales or other dimensions of unpredictability. Unpredictability could potentially become predictable for some children (Ugarte & Hastings, 2023), such that the same situation could be experienced as predictable or unpredictable by different children, depending on the schemas they have formed around unpredictability based on prior experiences (Cabeza de Baca et al, 2016).…”

Maternal Substance Use, Unpredictability of Sensory Signals and Child Cognitive Development: An Exploratory Study

“…Thus, we lack knowledge on how different mother-and child-related characteristics are associated with the unpredictability of maternal sensory signals, and what mechanisms may underlie our findings. Moreover, future studies should examine how child characteristics shape caregiver unpredictability, as the measure of entropy in a caregiver-child context comprises only caregiver's signals without acknowledging the dyadic nature of interaction (Ugarte & Hastings, 2023).…”

Testing different sources of environmental unpredictability on adolescent functioning: ancestral cue versus statistical learning and the role of temperament

“…income). Furthermore, although we observed parenting behavior on a minute-to-minute basis, we did not examine how different time intervals affect our parenting-unpredictability measure (Ugarte & Hastings, 2022). Additionally, although Young et al (2020) put forth several approaches in which statistical-learning unpredictability may manifest in time-series data (e.g.…”

“…income). Furthermore, although we observed parenting behavior on a minute‐to‐minute basis, we did not examine how different time intervals affect our parenting‐unpredictability measure (Ugarte & Hastings, 2022). Additionally, although Young et al.…”