Infant Development and Developmental Risk: A Review of the Past 10 Years

doi:10.1097/00004583-199702000-00007

Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry

Volume 36, Issue 2, February 1997, Pages 165-178

https://doi.org/10.1097/00004583-199702000-00007 Get rights and content

ABSTRACT

Objective

To review critically the research on infant developmental risk published in the past 10 years.

Method

A brief framework on development in the first 3 years is provided. This is followed by a review of pertinent studies of developmental risk, chosen to illustrate major risk conditions and the protective factors known to affect infant development. Illustrative risk conditions include prematurity and serious medical illness and infant temperament, infant-caregiver attachment, parental psychopathology, marital quality and interactions, poverty and social class, adolescent parenthood, and family violence.

Results

Risk and protective factors interact complexly. There are few examples of specific or linear links between risk conditions and outcomes during or beyond the first 3 years of life. Infant development is best appreciated within the context of caregiving relationships, which mediate the effects of both intrinsic and extrinsic risk conditions.

Conclusions

Complex and evolving interrelationships among risk factors are beginning to be elucidated. Linear models of cause and effect are of little use in understanding the development of psychopathology. Refining our markers of risk and demonstrating effective preventive interventions are the next important challenges.

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How do parents and early intervention professionals utilize educational resources about infant development and play?
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Parents utilize online sources to learn about health information, however few studies have examined where parents look for information about development or play for young children.
Investigate parents' and early intervention (EI) providers' practices and preferences regarding parent education about infant development and play.
Cross-sectional survey design.
112 parents and 138 EI providers participated.
One survey probed where parents look for information and preferred methods for receiving information about infant development and play. A second survey identified the parent education sources used and perceived quality of sources available by EI providers. Descriptive and inferential analyses were conducted.
112 parents and 138 EI providers participated. A greater proportion of parents sought information about development than play. Overall, parents used internet searches and preferred websites for education about development and play; however, parents of infants at risk for developmental delay preferred receiving developmental information through home visits or classes. Most EI providers have not asked parents where they look for information. A greater proportion of EI providers agreed existing sources about development, rather than about play, are high quality, but identified the need to develop high-quality sources about both topics.
There are a variety of methods that parents access and prefer for education about infant development and play. EI providers and other healthcare professionals should discuss the methods with parents to support parents in their quest for information and ensure parents receive high-quality information.
Predictors of psychological recommendations in child protection evaluation
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Citation Excerpt :
This however does not mean that they are not important in the individual case. From a theoretical point of view, the often cumulative risk mechanisms (and not the influence of individual specific risk factors) might form a possible explanation for this result (c.f. Baldwin, Baldwin, & Cole, 1990; Goodyer, 1994; Hooper, Burchinal, Roberts, Zeisel, & Neebe, 1998; Sabates & Dex, 2015; Zeanah, Boris, & Larrieu, 1997). A further explanation might be that the child-related factors included in the models are already outcomes of effective risk mechanisms.
Child protection matters from an important social and legal challenge, in which psychologists may be called upon to address a series of questions relevant for judicial decision-making. In an explorative manner, the current study investigates variables that influence psychological evaluators’ recommendations in child protection cases. The data is based on a quantitative content review of 103 psychological evaluation reports, conducted at an institute of forensic psychology in Germany. Using bivariate and logistic regression analyses, the following predictors were analyzed in this study: Child-related factors, familial risk factors, and general custody criteria. The outcome measure was the evaluator’s recommendation regarding long-term placement of the child and long-term custody arrangements. Evaluators were more likely to recommend permanent foster placement if the child showed insecure or disorganized attachment patterns, especially when combined with developmental delays, or if the child was temporarily in institutional or foster placement at the time of evaluation. The results support the conclusion that the most important factors for psychological expert recommendations refer to the “harm of the child” criterion in terms of developmental and psychological maladaptation.
Spanking and subsequent behavioral problems in toddlers: A propensity score-matched, prospective study in Japan
2017, Child Abuse and Neglect
Harsh or frequent spanking in early childhood is an established risk factor for later childhood behavioral problems as well as mental disorder in adulthood in Western societies. However, few studies have been conducted in Asian populations, where corporal punishment is relatively accepted. Moreover, the impacts of occasional spanking on subsequent behavioral problems remain uncertain. This study sought to investigate prospectively the association between the frequency of spanking of toddlers and later behavioral problems in Japanese children using national birth cohort data. We used data from the Longitudinal Survey of Newborns in the 21st Century, a population-based birth cohort data set collected by the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare (N = 29,182). Frequency of spanking (“never”, “sometimes” and “always”) and child behavioral problems were assessed via a caregiver questionnaire when the child was 3.5 years old and again at 5.5 years. Propensity score matching was used to examine the association between frequency of spanking and child behavioral problems, adjusting for parental socioeconomic status, child temperament and parenting behaviors. Compared to children who were never spanked, occasional spanking (“sometimes”) showed a higher number of behavioral problems (on a 6-point scale) (coefficient: 0.11, 95% CI: 0.07–0.15), and frequent spanking (“always”) showed an even larger number of behavioral problems compared with “sometimes” (coefficient: 0.08, 95% CI:0.01–0.16). Spanking of any self-reported frequency was associated with an increased risk for later behavioral problems in children.
The associations between infant development and parenting stress in infants with congenital heart disease at six and twelve months of age
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Developmental delays are among the major morbidities of children with complex congenital heart disease. Parents of infants with complex congenital heart disease experience increased parenting stress levels, which can interfere with parenting processes during infancy. The current study examined associations between infant development and parenting stress in infants with complex congenital heart disease at six and twelve months of age.
A secondary analysis of data examined cross-sectional associations between infant's mental and psychomotor development and parenting stress, using general linear regression modeling (N = 75). Data were obtained from a larger prospective cohort study.
Mental development was negatively associated with the Parent Domain at six months, and with the Parent Domain and Total Stress at twelve months. Psychomotor development was not significantly associated with parenting stress at six and twelve months.
Parenting stress in parents of infant with complex congenital heart disease may be among the factors shaping the parent–child relationship during the first year of life, which plays an important role in infant development. A potential bidirectional relationship between parenting stress and infant development may fit a transactional model representing the phenomena.
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Family interventions aiming to reshape illness perceptions may promote parental adaptive coping and productive parenting practices in populations at risk.
Does Love Matter to Infants' Health: Influence of Maternal Attachment Representations on Reports of Infant Health
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View all citing articles on Scopus

This is the eighth in a series of 10-year updates in child and adolescentpsychiatry. Topics are selected in consultation with the AACP Committee on Recertification. both for the importance of new research and its clinical or developmental significance. The authors have been asked to place an asterisk before the five or six most seminal references.

j. McD.

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SPECIAL ARTICLEInfant Development and Developmental Risk: A Review of the Past 10 Years

ABSTRACT

Objective

Method

Results

Conclusions

Alcohol Drug Depend

J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry

Dev Rev

J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry

J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry

Infant Behav Dev

Infant Behav Dev

Pediatr Clin North Am

Neurobehav Toxicol Teratol

J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry

Newborns of depressed mothers

Infant Ment Health J

Child maltreatment, attachment, and the self system: emergence of an internal state lexicon in toddlers at high social risk

Dev Psychopathol

Environmental risks, biological risks, and developmental outcome

Dev Psychol

Stability and transmission of attachment across three generations

Child Dev

Depression in first-time mothers: mother-infant interaction and depression chronicity

Dev Psychol

Finding order in disorganization: lessons from research on maltreated infants' attachments to their caregivers

Continuity and change in infant shyness from 14 to 20 months

Behav Genet

Attachment organization in maltreated preschoolers

Dev Psychopathol

Face-to-face interactions of depressed mothers and their infants

Maternal and environmental factors affecting developmental outcome of infants of adolescent mothers

J Dev Behav Pediatr

Marriage, adult adjustment, and early parenting

Child Dev

Family patterns of relationship in normative and dysfunctional families

Dev Psychopathol

Predictors and correlates of anger toward and punitive control of toddlers by adolescent mothers

Child Dev

The influence of conflict between adults on the emotions and aggression of young children

Dev Psychol

Young children's responses to expressions of anger and affection by others in the family

Child Dev

Children's responses to angry adult behavior as a function of marital distress and history of interparent hostility

Child Dev

Frontal lobe activity and affective behavior of infants and mothers with depressive symptoms

Child Dev

Attachment with affectively ill and well mothers: concurrent behavioral correlates

Dev Psychopathol

Economic deprivation and early childhood development

Child Dev

Young children's responses to constructive marital disputes

J Fam Psychol

The affective self: continuities and transformations from infancy

Infants of depressed mothers

Dev Psychopathol

Relative right frontal EEG activation in 3- to 6-month-old infants of depressed mothers

Dev Psychol

Behavior state matching in mother-infant interactions of non-depressed vs depressed mother-infant dyads

Dev Psychol

Vagal tone in infants of depressed mothers

Dev Psychopathol

Maternal representations of attachment during pregnancy predict the organization of infant-mother attachment at one year of age

Child Dev

An outline of psychoanalysis

Roundtable: what is temperament? Four approaches

Child Dev

The psychobiology of infant temperament

Perinatal substance abusers: psychological and social characteristics

J Nerv Ment Dis

Poverty and infant development

Maternal and paternal disciplinary styles: relations with preschoolers' playground behavioral orientations and peer status

Child Dev

Teenage mothers and their children: risks and problems. A review

Can J Psychiatry

Material deprivation, child maltreatment, and agency interventions among poor families

Infants of “depressed” mothers interact better with their nondepressed fathers

Infant Ment Health J

Marital quality and child functioning: a longitudinal investigation

SPECIAL ARTICLE
Infant Development and Developmental Risk: A Review of the Past 10 Years