Mediators of change for multisystemic therapy with juvenile sexual offenders.

The mediators of favorable multisystemic therapy (MST) outcomes achieved at 12 months postrecruitment were examined within the context of a randomized effectiveness trial with 127 juvenile sexual offenders and their caregivers. Outcome measures assessed youth delinquency, substance use, externalizing symptoms, and deviant sexual interest/risk behaviors; hypothesized mediators included measures of parenting and peer relations. Data were collected at pretreatment, 6 months postrecruitment, and 12 months postrecruitment. Consistent with the MST theory of change and the small extant literature in this area of research, analyses showed that favorable MST effects on youth antisocial behavior and deviant sexual interest/risk behaviors were mediated by increased caregiver follow-through on discipline practices as well as decreased caregiver disapproval of and concern about the youth’s bad friends during the follow-up. These findings have important implications for the community-based treatment of juvenile sexual offenders. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comparing indicators of sexual sadism as predictors of recidivism among adult male sexual offenders.

Objective: In this longitudinal study, the predictive validity of a psychiatric diagnosis of sexual sadism was compared with three behavioral indicators of sadism: index sexual offense violence, sexual intrusiveness, and phallometrically assessed sexual arousal to depictions of sexual or nonsexual violence. Method: Five hundred and eighty six adult male sexual offenders were assessed between 1982 and 1992, and these offenders were followed for up to 20-years postrelease via official criminal records. Assessment information included the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) diagnosis, offense characteristics, phallometric assessment results, and an actuarial risk measure (the Sex Offender Risk Appraisal Guide). Results: Predictive validity was demonstrated in univariate analyses for the behavioral indicators of sexual sadism (area under the curve [AUCs] from .58 to .62) but not psychiatric diagnosis (AUC = .54). Cox regression analyses revealed that phallometrically assessed sexual arousal to violence was still significantly associated with violent (including sexual) recidivism after actuarially estimated risk to reoffend was controlled. A psychiatric diagnosis of sexual sadism, in contrast, was unrelated to recidivism. Conclusions: The results support the use of more behaviorally operationalized indicators of sexual sadism, especially phallometric assessment of sexual arousal, and suggest the DSM criteria for sexual sadism require further work. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Quantitative reanalysis of aggregate data on IQ in sexual offenders.

General intelligence has been the most commonly studied neuropsychological characteristic of sexual offenders for over 70 years. Results, however, have been highly inconsistent. To assess whether sexual offenders score lower in IQ than nonsexual offenders and to explore which sexual offense characteristics relate to IQ, the authors reanalyzed all reports providing sufficient information. Data spanned 236 samples, comprising 25,146 sexual offenders and controls. The literature contained sufficient information to permit comparison of adult versus juvenile sexual offenders, offenders targeting children versus adults, offenders targeting their own versus unrelated children, and offenders targeting boys versus girls. Results confirm the association between IQ and sexual offending and suggest that previous discrepancies are attributable to how many pedophilic individuals were in each sample. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Marital and severe parent-to-adolescent physical aggression in clinic-referred families: Mother and adolescent reports on co-occurence and links to child behavior problems.

This study examined the interplay of marital and severe parental physical aggression, and their links to child behavior problems, in 232 families of clinic-referred adolescents. Combined reports from mothers and adolescents indicated that two thirds of adolescents exposed to marital aggression in the past year had also experienced parental aggression. Mothers and fathers who used and/or were victims of marital aggression were both more likely to direct aggression toward their adolescent. Mother and youth reports of marital aggression were tied to each party's report of greater externalizing problems and to youth reports of greater internalizing problems. Severe parental aggression uniquely predicted maternal reports of both behavior problems, after controlling for marital aggression; the reverse was not true. Also, adolescents exposed to both types of family aggression did not display greater maladjustment than those subjected to only one type of family aggression. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Individual and familial influences on the onset of sexual intercourse among urban African American adolescents.

A sample of 198 African American families, living in urban poverty, participated in a longitudinal study of adolescent sexual development beginning when children were in the 4th or 5th grade. Self-reports of family conflict and pubertal development and videotaped family interaction data were collected at 2 time points approximately 2 years apart. Youths reported on sexual debut at each time point. More boys than girls reached sexual debut early. Greater levels of family conflict predicted early sexual debut. Observational data indicated more developed preadolescents with greater family conflict and less positive affect were least likely to delay debut. Changes in pubertal development and observed family conflict were associated with early debut. Possible mediating mechanisms and implications for preventive interventions are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of contextual risk, impulsivity, and parental knowledge in the development of adolescent antisocial behavior.

The present study (a) tests main and moderational effects of neighborhood and family risk, and adolescent impulsivity on the development of male and female antisocial behavior (ASB) and (b) examines the extent to which these effects work indirectly through parental knowledge. Adolescents (N = 4,597; 51% male) reported on informal social control in their neighborhoods, their family types, and impulsivity at age 12, and on parental monitoring and ASB at ages 13 and 15 years. Neighborhoods were further defined as risk and nonrisk in economic deprivation by census-level data. Main effects of neighborhood risk, single parenthood, and impulsivity on ASB were found for male and female adolescents. For female adolescents, impulsivity interacted with neighborhood economic deprivation and with family type in the prediction of parental knowledge. Impulsivity and contextual risk factors in part increased adolescent ASB through decreasing parental knowledge. Theoretical and policy implications are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self and parent ratings of executive functioning after adolescent traumatic brain injury.

Objective: To examine the level of agreement between adolescents with traumatic brain injury (TBI) and their parents in standardized ratings of executive functioning, and to determine correlates of discrepancies between those ratings. Participants: Ninety-eight 11- to 16-year-old adolescents with TBI and their parents, and 97 neuropsychologically healthy controls. Method: Five-year consecutive series of rehabilitation referrals for TBI. Measures: Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function–Self Report (BRIEF–SR) and Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF) parent report versions. Results: Self and parent ratings were moderately positively correlated in both the TBI group and the control group, but parents generally identified more executive dysfunction than did the adolescents. Parent-adolescent discrepancies were statistically significantly greater in the TBI group than in the control group on the Metacognitive index but not the Behavioral Regulation index. The degree of the former discrepancy was predicted by duration of coma in the TBI group. Conclusions: Adolescents with more severe TBI may underestimate their own degree of executive dysfunction in daily life, particularly aspects of metacognitive abilities, possibly, in part, because of an organic-based lack of deficit awareness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Exploring the role of parent training in the treatment of childhood anxiety.

Data from a randomized clinical trial comparing the relative efficacy of individual cognitive–behavioral therapy (ICBT), family CBT (FCBT), and a family-based education/support/attention control (FESA) condition were used to examine associations between in-session therapeutic techniques related to parent training (PT) and treatment outcomes. This study explored the extent to which therapists’ use of PT techniques, specifically (a) parental anxiety management, (b) transfer of control from therapist to parent to child over child’s coping, (c) communication skills training, and (d) contingency management training, contributed to treatment outcome in family-based CBT. Children (N = 53; 31 males; 7.8–13.8 years of age; M = 10.1 years, SD = 2.3; 85% Caucasian, 9% African American, 4% Asian, 2% “other” background) with a principal anxiety disorder completed 16 sessions of CBT with their parents. The relative contributions of PT components on treatment outcome were evaluated. As hypothesized, both transfer-of-control and parental anxiety management techniques significantly contributed to improvement on clinician and parent ratings of child global functioning within FCBT. PT did not significantly contribute to improvement on measures of child anxiety. These preliminary findings suggest that when FCBT is conducted for child anxiety, PT (i.e., transfer-of-control and parental anxiety management techniques) may contribute to improvements in the child’s global functioning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Efficacy of brief strategic family therapy in modifying Hispanic adolescent behavior problems and substance use.

This study investigated the efficacy of brief strategic family therapy (BSFT) with Hispanic behavior problem and drug using youth, an underrepresented population in the family therapy research literature. One hundred twenty-six Hispanic families with a behavior problem adolescent were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 conditions: BSFT or group treatment control (GC). Results showed that, compared to GC cases, BSFT cases showed significantly greater pre- to post-intervention improvement in parent reports of adolescent conduct problems and delinquency, adolescent reports of marijuana use, and observer ratings and self reports of family functioning. These results extend prior findings on the efficacy of family interventions to a difficult to treat Hispanic adolescent sample. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interpersonal characteristics of male criminal offenders: Personality, psychopathological, and behavioral correlates.

Interest in conceptualizing the interpersonal style of individuals who engage in serious antisocial behavior has increased in recent years. This study examines the personality, psychopathological, and behavioral correlates of interpersonal dominance and warmth, as operationalized via scales of the Personality Assessment Inventory (L. Morey, 2007), across several samples of male prison inmates (combined N = 1,062). Consistent with theory, multivariate analyses indicated that low warmth and, to a lesser extent, high dominance were associated with antisocial and paranoid traits, specifically, and externalizing-spectrum psychopathology more generally, whereas borderline traits and internalizing-spectrum psychopathology were uniquely associated with low interpersonal warmth. Among smaller subsamples of inmates followed prospectively, high dominance and, to a lesser extent, low warmth predicted general and aggressive institutional misconduct, whereas dominance uniquely predicted staff ratings of treatment noncompliance/failure. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Tightly linked systems: Reciprocal relations between maternal depressive symptoms and maternal reports of adolescent externalizing behavior.

The frequently observed link between maternal depressive symptoms and heightened maternal reporting of adolescent externalizing behavior was examined from an integrative, systems perspective using a community sample of 180 adolescents, their mothers, fathers, and close peers, assessed twice over a 3-year period. Consistent with this perspective, the maternal depression–adolescent externalizing link was found to reflect not simply maternal reporting biases, but heightened maternal sensitivity to independently observable teen misbehavior as well as long-term, predictive links between maternal symptoms and teen behavior. Maternal depressive symptoms predicted relative increases over time in teen externalizing behavior. Child effects were also found, however, in which teen externalizing behavior predicted future relative increases in maternal depressive symptoms. Findings are interpreted as revealing a tightly linked behavioral-affective system in families with mothers experiencing depressive symptoms and teens engaged in externalizing behavior and further suggest that research on depressive symptoms in women with adolescent offspring should now consider offspring externalizing behaviors as a significant risk factor. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Constructive thinking, executive functioning, antisocial behavior, and drug use involvement in adolescent females with a substance use disorder.

The aim of this study was to determine how constructive thinking (CT), executive functioning (EF), and antisocial behavior (ASB) are related to drug use involvement in 282 adolescent females, 14–18 yrs of age, with a substance use disorder (SUD) and in controls. CT was measured using the Constructive Thinking Inventory, EF was measured using a battery of neuropsychological tests, and ASB was measured using the Youth Self-Report Inventory and a psychiatric interview. Females with an SUD demonstrated lower CT and EF scores and higher ASB scores compared with the controls. Low CT and low EF were significantly related to increased drug use involvement even when controlling for age, socioeconomic status, and vocabulary level. ASB partially mediated the relation between CT and drug use involvement, and it fully mediated the relation between EF and drug use involvement. Moreover, ASB moderated the relation between EF and drug use involvement. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Utilization of emotion cues in male and female offenders with antisocial personality disorder: Results from a lexical decision task.

Antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) diagnoses have demonstrated good reliability and validity in male offenders. However, there is a paucity of research assessing utilization of emotion cues in ASPD individuals and the extent to which correlates of ASPD in males generalize to females. This investigation examined emotion utilization in incarcerated men and women with and without ASPD using a lexical decision task with emotional and neutral words. The performance of male offenders with ASPD was similar to that of male controls, whereas women with ASPD demonstrated greater emotional facilitation than female controls. Moreover, the number of violent crimes committed by female inmates with ASPD was related to emotion facilitation, suggesting a link between their sensitivity to emotion cues and antisocial behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Trajectories of family management practices and early adolescent behavioral outcomes.

Stage–environment fit theory was used to examine the reciprocal lagged relations between family management practices and early adolescent problem behavior during the middle school years. In addition, the potential moderating roles of family structure and of gender were explored. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to describe patterns of growth in family management practices and adolescents' behavioral outcomes and to detect predictors of interindividual differences in initial status and rate of change. The sample comprised approximately 1,000 adolescents between ages 11 years and 15 years. The results indicated that adolescents' antisocial behaviors and substance use increased and their positive behavioral engagement decreased over time. As adolescent age increased, parental knowledge of their adolescent's activities decreased, as did parental rule making and support. The level and rate of change in family management and adolescent behavioral outcomes varied by family structure and by gender. Reciprocal longitudinal associations between parenting practices and adolescent problem behavior were found. Specifically, parenting practices predicted subsequent adolescent behavior, and adolescent behavior predicted subsequent parenting practices. In addition, parental warmth moderated the effects of parental knowledge and rule making on adolescent antisocial behavior and substance use over time. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Pretreatment social relations, therapeutic alliance, and improvements in parenting practices in parent management training.

The authors examined the parent-therapist alliance in parent management training for children (N = 218; 53 girls and 165 boys, ages 2-14) referred clinically for oppositional, aggressive, and antisocial behavior. The interrelations of pretreatment parent social relationships, the parent-therapist alliance over the course of treatment, and improvements in parenting practices at the end of treatment were evaluated by different raters. As expected, the better the quality of the parent-therapist alliance, the greater the improvements in parenting practices by the end of treatment. Social relations of the parents prior to treatment were associated with the parent-therapist alliance during treatment and parental improvements at the end of treatment. The relation between the therapeutic alliance and improvement in parenting practices was partially explained by pretreatment parent social relations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Early therapeutic alliance and treatment outcome in individual and family therapy for adolescent behavior problems.

The impact of early therapeutic alliance was examined in 100 clients receiving either individual cognitive- behavioral therapy (CBT) or family therapy for adolescent substance abuse. Observational ratings of adolescent alliance in CBT and adolescent and parent alliance in family therapy were used to predict treatment retention (in CBT only) and outcome (drug use, externalizing, and internalizing symptoms in both conditions) at post and 6-month follow-up. There were no alliance effects in CBT. In family therapy, stronger parent alliance predicted declines in drug use and externalizing. Adolescents with weak early alliances that subsequently improved by midtreatment showed significantly greater reductions in externalizing than adolescents whose alliances declined. Results underscore the need for ongoing developmental calibration of intervention theory and practice for adolescent clinical populations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Gender and sexual orientation differences in sexual response to sexual activities versus gender of actors in sexual films.

In this study, the authors investigated the hypothesis that women's sexual orientation and sexual responses in the laboratory correlate less highly than do men's because women respond primarily to the sexual activities performed by actors, whereas men respond primarily to the gender of the actors. The participants were 20 homosexual women, 27 heterosexual women, 17 homosexual men, and 27 heterosexual men. The videotaped stimuli included men and women engaging in same-sex intercourse, solitary masturbation, or nude exercise (no sexual activity); human male-female copulation; and animal (bonobo chimpanzee or Pan paniscus) copulation. Genital and subjective sexual arousal were continuously recorded. The genital responses of both sexes were weakest to nude exercise and strongest to intercourse. As predicted, however, actor gender was more important for men than for women, and the level of sexual activity was more important for women than for men. Consistent with this result, women responded genitally to bonobo copulation, whereas men did not. An unexpected result was that homosexual women responded more to nude female targets exercising and masturbating than to nude male targets, whereas heterosexual women responded about the same to both sexes at each activity level. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Adult social behavioral effects of heavy adolescent marijuana use among African Americans.

The authors examined the effects of heavy adolescent marijuana use on employment, marriage, and family formation and tested both dropping out of high school and adult marijuana use as potential mediators of these associations among a community sample of African Americans followed longitudinally from age 6 to age 32-33. They used propensity score matching to reduce selection bias when estimating the effects of heavy adolescent marijuana use. Logistic regression results on the sample matched on sex, and early demographic and behavioral variables showed that adolescent marijuana use has adult social behavioral consequences: Use of marijuana 20 times or more during adolescence was associated with being unemployed and unmarried in young adulthood and having children outside of marriage for both males and females. Dropping out of high school and more frequent adult marijuana use seem to be important parts of the pathway from adolescent marijuana use to negative life outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Psychosocial concerns of sexual minority youth: Complexity and caution in group differences.

This investigation tested a large adolescent sample (n = 14,439) for significant group differences on psychosocial concerns on the basis of intersecting identities of sexual orientation (lesbian, gay, bisexual, questioning/less certain, heterosexual), race (Whites, racial minorities), and gender (boys, girls). A significant 2-way interaction between sexual orientation and gender was identified on victimization. Boys reported higher victimization than did girls among heterosexual and questioning/less certain students. Furthermore, significant 3-way interactions between sexual orientation, race, and gender were identified for substance use and depressed/suicidal thoughts. Questioning/less certain youth generally reported the highest levels of victimization, substance abuse, and suicidal thoughts. However, results suggest that, on the basis of small effect sizes for most comparisons, significant differences should be interpreted with caution. Results indicate the need to consider the diversity of subgroups within the sexual minority youth community and that intervention efforts might be more effective if tailored to the unique needs of specific subgroups. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Evidence-based parent and family interventions in school psychology: A commentary.

Do the authors provide us with convincing evidence that parent and family interventions change children's behavior and learning at school? The answer is not a simple or straightforward one. First off, there appears to be more support for interventions that are part of a multi-component program, that are highly focused in scope, and that entail active collaboration between parents, students, and the schools; hence, more support appears to be available for family/parent consultation and family-school collaboration/partnership programs than for the more unidirectional and limited parent education and parent involvement programs. Second, although 100 studies are examined, it is readily apparent that the studies reported on in the various reviews are characterized by numerous methodological shortcomings that compromise their scientific integrity and the conclusions we can safely draw from them. Third, it is evident that nearly all of the efficacious treatments are behavior or cognitive-behavioral ones. Fourth and finally, it will be important to begin to identify the students, families, and schools that are most likely to benefit from the various interventions and to examine the specific mechanisms of change in each of the proposed interventions. In sum, it seems safe to conclude that evidentiary support for the effectiveness of parent and family interventions in school psychology is mixed at best. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)