Somatic symptom and related disorders in pediatric patients: Associations with parent psychiatric and substance use histories.

Parental response to pediatric patients with somatic symptom and related disorders (SSRDs) can impact symptom presentation. However, little is known about the impact of parent psychiatric and substance use disorder (SUD) history on the functional status and medical healthcare utilization of patients with SSRDs. The current study explored the associations between parent psychiatric & SUD history and patient somatic symptoms, functional disability, and hospital course in a medically hospitalized sample of pediatric patients with SSRDs. The electronic medical records of 375 pediatric patients with SSRDs, ages 5 to 18, admitted at a tertiary pediatric hospital were retrospectively reviewed. Parent psychiatric histories were identified in 45.1% of the sample. Parent SUD history and maternal psychiatric history were associated with more patient reported somatization. Parent psychiatric and SUD history were not associated with pediatric patients' level of functional disability or healthcare utilization during admission, including admission length, number of tests, and number of consultations obtained. This study has implications regarding reduction of potential stigma towards parents with psychiatric or SUD histories whose children are hospitalized with SSRDs. While such histories may provide insights regarding somatization presentation of pediatric patients with these disorders, it may not necessarily impact level of functional disability or hospital course.

Happy babies, chatty toddlers: infant positive affect facilitates early expressive, but not receptive language.

Eighty-three mother-infant dyads participated in this study. Positive affect (PA) broadly, along with fine-grained aspects of PA, was measured at 10 months of age. Language was measured at 14 months. Infant PA predicted expressive, but not receptive, language. The implications of these findings are discussed.

Maternal self-regulation, relationship adjustment, and home chaos: contributions to infant negative emotionality.

There has been increasing interest in the direct and indirect effects of parental self-regulation on children's outcomes. In the present investigation, the effects of maternal self-regulation, home chaos, and inter-parental relationship adjustment on broad and specific indicators of infant negative emotionality (NE) were examined. A sample of maternal caregivers and their 4-month-old infants (N = 85) from a rural community participated. Results demonstrated that better maternal self-regulation was associated with lower infant NE broadly, as well as with lower infant sadness and distress to limitations/frustration and better falling reactivity (i.e., emotion regulation), specifically. Maternal self-regulation also predicted less chaotic home environments and better maternal inter-parental relationship adjustment. Findings also supported the indirect effects of maternal self-regulation on broad and specific indicators of infant NE through home chaos and maternal relationship adjustment. Some differential effects were also identified. Elevated home chaos appeared to specifically affect infant frustration/distress to limitations whereas maternal relationship adjustment affected broad infant NE, as well as several specific indicators of infant NE: frustration/distress to limitations, sadness, and falling reactivity. In conjunction with other recent investigations that have reported the effects of maternal self-regulation on parenting, the findings in the present investigation suggest that parental self-regulation may influence children's outcomes through several proximal environmental pathways.

Integrating and differentiating aspects of self-regulation: effortful control, executive functioning, and links to negative affectivity.

Subdisciplines within psychology frequently examine self-regulation from different frameworks despite conceptually similar definitions of constructs. In the current study, similarities and differences between effortful control, based on the psychobiological model of temperament (Rothbart, Derryberry, & Posner, 1994), and executive functioning are examined and empirically tested in three studies (n = 509). Structural equation modeling indicated that effortful control and executive functioning are strongly associated and overlapping constructs (Study 1). Additionally, results indicated that effortful control is related to the executive function of updating/monitoring information in working memory, but not inhibition (Studies 2 and 3). Study 3 also demonstrates that better updating/monitoring information in working memory and better effortful control were uniquely linked to lower dispositional negative affect, whereas the executive function of low/poor inhibition was uniquely associated with an increased tendency to express negative affect. Furthermore, dispositional negative affect mediated the links between effortful control and, separately, the executive function of updating/monitoring information in working memory and the tendency to express negative affect. The theoretical implications of these findings are discussed, and a potential framework for guiding future work directed at integrating and differentiating aspects of self-regulation is suggested.