Early Prediction of Violence and the Disruptive Behaviour Disorders: Follow-up of the Cardiff Child Development Study

我们在卡迪夫儿童发展研究(CCDS)中的目标是识别那些高度攻击性的儿童，并在与其他儿童打交道时遇到严重困难，同时考虑到出生后最初几年攻击性的任何自然起伏。将临床上重要的行为问题与更常见的行为不端形式和两三岁儿童特有的自我主张区分开来，这一点极其重要。当这位母亲怀上她的第一个孩子时，300多个家庭加入了这项研究。在怀孕期间，我们采访了母亲和父亲，询问了他们的背景、健康状况以及他们对孩子的希望和计划。然后，我们在6个月到3岁生日之间，在家访(6个月和21个月)和心理学院的生日派对期间观察了四次婴儿，在那里婴儿遇到了参与研究的其他家庭的婴儿。我们对生日派对的观察显示，与许多父母的看法相反，婴儿更有可能彼此分享玩具，而不是试图抓住玩具，而且极不可能攻击其他婴儿。然而，即使在生命的第一年，很明显，一些婴儿似乎比其他婴儿更愤怒和更具攻击性；如果他们的家庭经历了困难，如果他们的父母有行为问题史，如果他们的母亲在怀孕期间吸烟或抑郁，婴儿更有可能表现出攻击性。母亲、父亲和其他了解婴儿的家庭成员报告了他们攻击性的早期迹象。家庭成员的报告与我们在生日派对上的观察结果相呼应；例如，父母有行为问题的婴儿更有可能攻击其他婴儿。根据父母和其他家庭成员的报告，一年后，婴儿表现出愤怒或攻击性的倾向仍然很明显。因此，我们认为，我们可能已经确定，这些婴儿将最难适应学校，他们可能会出现严重的行为和情感问题。为了验证这一假设，我们建议通过在孩子6岁时再次观察他们来完成CCDS。我们将在家里探望这些家庭，并与他们的父母一起观察孩子们，在许多情况下，还有他们的弟弟妹妹。我们计划使用各种游戏和虚拟现实任务来衡量孩子们解决问题的能力，控制他们的冲动，并选择非侵略性的解决方案来解决其他人的挑战性行为造成的困境。我们还将使用成熟的方法来确定是否有儿童在临床上表现出显著的情绪或行为问题，我们将获得家长的许可，要求教师报告儿童在学校的行为。我们还将测量儿童的活动量和心率，以确定生物因素是否会导致他们的行为和情绪问题。如果我们的假设得到证实--如果我们确实已经确定了那些已经走上暴力行为道路的婴儿--那么就有可能确定家庭和学校中帮助儿童控制愤怒并找到应对日常挑战的建设性方法的因素。因此，CCDS提供了一个独特的证据体系，可以为帮助问题儿童的预防和干预战略提供信息。

Our aim in the Cardiff Child Development Study (CCDS) has been to identify children who are highly aggressive and have serious difficulties dealing with other children, while taking into account any natural rise and fall in aggressiveness over the first years of life. It is extremely important to distinguish clinically significant behavioural problems from more ordinary forms of misbehaviour and the self-assertion that is characteristic of two-and three-year-olds. Over 300 families joined the study when the mother was pregnant with her first child. During the pregnancy, we interviewed both mother and father about their backgrounds, their health, and their hopes and plans for their babies. We then observed the infants four times between 6 months and the third birthday, during home visits (at 6 and 21 months) and birthday parties at the School of Psychology, where infants met other infants from other families who were participating in the study. Our observations of the birthday parties revealed that, contrary to many parents' beliefs, infants were more likely to share toys with each other than to try to grab toys, and were highly unlikely to strike out at other babies. However, even in the first year of life it was clear that some infants seemed more angry and aggressive than others; infants were more likely to show aggression if their families had experienced hardship, if their parents had a history of behavioural problems, and if their mothers had smoked cigarettes or been depressed during the pregnancy. Their early signs of aggressiveness were reported by mothers, fathers, and other family members who knew the infants well. What the family members reported was echoed by our observations during the birthday parties; for example, infants whose parents had behavioural problems were more likely to strike out at other infants. Infants' tendencies to show anger or be aggressive were still apparent a year later, as reported by parents and other family members. We therefore believe it is possible that we have already identified those infants will have the most difficulties settling into school and who may develop serious behavioural and emoitonal problems. To test this hypothesis, we propose to complete the CCDS by seeing the children again when they are 6 years old. We will visit the families at home and observe the children with their parents and, in many cases, younger siblings. We plan to use a variety of games and virtual reality tasks to measure the children's abilities to solve problems, control their impulses, and choose non-aggressive solutions to the dilemmas created by other people's challenging behaviour. We will also use well-established methods for determining whether any of the children are showing clinically significant emotional or behavioural problems, and we will get parents' permission to ask teachers to report on the children's behaviour at school. We will also measure the children's activity and heart rate to see if biological factors underlie their behavioural and emotional problems. If our hypothesis is confirmed--if we have indeed identified those infants who are already on a pathway to violent behaviour--it may be possible to identify the factors at home and in school that help children control their anger and find constructive ways to deal with everyday challenges. Thus the CCDS provides a unique body of evidence that can inform prevention and intervention strategies to help troubled children.