Family and Peer Processes and G-E Interplay in Middle School: An Adoption Study

描述（申请人提供）：进入中学是一个关键的过渡；孩子们面临着更高的学业期望，不得不与父母重新协商关系，并陷入同龄人的圈子。同伴对儿童在中学时期的适应和不良行为的影响越来越大，家长必须获得新的技能来促进儿童的适应。有些孩子未能顺利过渡到中学，并从事社会越轨行为，包括入店行窃、逃学、性行为早熟、酗酒或吸毒；其他孩子则会出现抑郁或焦虑的问题。就以儿童为重点的服务系统的成本以及儿童和家庭的长期健康和福祉而言，这些行为结果具有很高的公共卫生影响。虽然众所周知，在这一发育时期，父母和同伴对儿童有重大影响，但很少有研究调查儿童受遗传影响的特征对这些重要关系的影响（唤起性基因-环境相关性，rGE）。甚至更少的研究调查了遗传脆弱性如何在这一时期调节同伴或父母的影响（基因-环境相互作用，GxE）。收养设计是检测唤起性rGE和GxE的最强工具之一，因为它可以从家庭环境效应中分解遗传倾向的影响。我们可以将遗传和后天环境的影响分开，因为前者来自亲生父母，后者来自收养家庭，然后我们可以研究它们是如何在发展过程中共同作用的。提出的研究提供了一个独特的机会来研究从婴儿期到青春期早期的GxE和唤起性rGE。在对361名出生时被收养的儿童、他们的养父母和他们的亲生父母进行研究的基础上，我们建议收集11岁和13岁儿童的新数据，以便跨越从小学到中学的发展过渡。在此之前，参与者从婴儿期到8岁期间都会定期接受面对面的评估。在拟议的研究中，被收养的孩子和他们的养父母将在大约11岁（小学毕业）和13岁（两年后，在中学）时接受评估，13岁时接受同伴评估，11岁时接受亲生父母评估。本研究的创新之处在于，收养设计具有独特的能力，能够理清遗传和环境影响的影响，并研究它们之间的相互作用；丰富的现有数据，包括大量关于父亲的数据，以及对两性相互作用机制的关注。具体目标是：(1)确定结合遗传影响的特定家庭和同伴过程，以促进13岁儿童的社会能力和预防问题行为（GxE）；(2)识别引起特定养育和同伴过程（rGE）的受遗传影响的儿童行为；(3)研究HPA轴调节（昼夜节律）作为调节父母和同伴影响和介导GxE对儿童适应的生物学机制。通过进一步了解G-E的相互作用，以及环境对发育影响的生物学机制，本研究的发现可以用来识别在这一关键过渡时期适应不良风险较高的儿童，以及促进社会能力和福祉的因素。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Entry into middle school is a critical transition; children are faced with increased academic expectations, have to renegotiate relationships with their parents, and become enmeshed in the peer realm. Peers have an increasing influence on child adaptive and maladaptive behavior during middle school, and parents must acquire new skills to promote child adjustment. Some children fail to navigate the transition to middle school successfully, and engage in socially deviant behaviors including shoplifting, truancy, precocious sexual behavior, and alcohol or drug use; other children develop problems with depression or anxiety. These behavioral outcomes have a high public health impact, both in terms of the costs to child-focused service systems, and to the long-term health and well-being of children and families. Although it is well known that parents and peers have a substantial influence on children during this developmental period, few studies have examined the impact of children's genetically-influenced characteristics on these important relationships (evocative gene-environment correlation, rGE). Even fewer studies have examined how genetic vulnerabilities moderate peer or parenting effects during this period (gene-environment interaction, GxE). The adoption design is one of the strongest tools for detecting evocative rGE and GxE because it can disaggregate the influences of genetic propensities from family environmental effects. We can separate genetic and postnatal environmental influences because the former comes from the biological parents, and the latter from the adoptive family, and we can then examine how they work together across development. The proposed study provides a unique opportunity to study GxE and evocative rGE as they unfold from infancy to early adolescence. Building on a study of 361 children who were adopted at birth, their adoptive parents, and their biological parents, we propose to collect new data at child age 11 and 13 years in order to span the developmental transition from elementary school to middle school. Participants have previously been assessed in-person at regular intervals from infancy to age 8. In the proposed study, adopted children and their adoptive parents will be assessed at approximately age 11 (end of elementary school) and 13 (two years later, in middle school), with a peer assessment at age 13 and a biological parent assessment at child age 11. Innovations of the proposed study include the unique ability of the adoption design to disentangle the effects of genetic and environmental influences and study their interplay; the rich existing data, including a wealth of data on fathers and the focus on mechanisms underlying G-E interplay. Specific aims are: (1) To identify specific family and peer processes that combine with genetic influences to promote social competence and prevent problem behavior through child age 13 (GxE); (2) To identify genetically-influenced child behaviors that evoke specific parenting and peer processes (rGE); and (3) To examine HPA axis regulation (diurnal rhythm) as a biological mechanism that may moderate parent and peer influences and mediate GxE effects on child adjustment. By furthering the understanding of G-E interplay, and the biological mechanisms that underlie environmental influences on development, findings from this study could be used to identify children at heightened risk for maladjustment during this critical transition, and factors that promote social competence and well-being.