The ripple effect of trauma: Evaluating vulnerability, post-traumatic stress symptoms, and aggression within a child and adolescent population.

BACKGROUND: The deleterious effects of experiencing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), especially those associated with child abuse and neglect (CM-ACEs), is well documented. Two common behavioral and emotional concerns observed in children following CM-ACEs is post-traumatic stress and aggression. While support for cognitive models explaining both of these outcomes exists, little is known about any shared cognitive vulnerabilities that may explain the presence of both. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of the current study was to evaluate a cognitive model of vulnerability/safety as a shared underlying mechanism for the development of post-traumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) and aggression following the occurrence of CM-ACEs in children. METHODS: Male youth between the ages of 6 and 14 attending school within a residential setting participated in a school-based performance improvement program. As a part of the program, data were collected on the child's history of abuse, PTSS, aggression, and feelings of safety and vulnerability. RESULTS: The results of the SEM suggested that there was a significant serial indirect effect of vulnerability and PTSS on the relation between CM-ACEs and reactive aggression. This was not true for proactive aggression. DISCUSSION: The current results suggest that that there may be a shared schema-based model in which feelings of vulnerability and cognitive models promoting the world as an unsafe place may contribute to the maintenance and development of both PTSS and reactive aggression among children who have experienced abuse/neglect.

Exploring the Nexus of Adverse Childhood Experiences and Aggression in Children and Adolescents: A Scoping Review.

A strong relation between adverse childhood experiences (ACE) and aggression has been established in adult populations, with less research examining this relation earlier in development. The purpose of this study was to complete a scoping review of the current evidence available on the relation between ACE and aggression and subtypes of aggression within a child and adolescent population. Inclusion criteria for the review included publications in English between 1998 and 2023, use of a child/adolescent population, and peer-review and quantitative publications. Databases searched included PubMed, APA PsycINFO, Scopus, and EBSCO, and search terms included words related to ACE and aggression. Initial selection was based on title and abstract, with 32 papers meeting eligibility criteria for inclusion. Two authors extracted the relevant characteristics of the studies independently and conferred on any disagreements. The overall findings from the scoping review suggest that there is a strong link between aggression and ACE; however, this link may not be as strong for specific subtypes of aggression. Additionally, characteristics of ACE may play role in understanding this relation, but little research is available within a child and adolescent population. A few studies have attempted to examine potential mediators and moderators of this relation; however, none have been replicated within a child and adolescent population. The findings from this review support the need for additional research in this area and identify significant gaps in the literature that need to be addressed within a child and adolescent population.

Pathways to Suicidal Behavior in Children and Adolescents: Examination of Child Maltreatment and Post-Traumatic Symptoms.

Suicide in youth exacts significant personal and community costs. Thus, it is important to understand predisposing risk factors. Experiencing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), such as child maltreatment (CM-ACE), and the presence of post-traumatic stress disorder has been identified as a risk factor of suicidal behaviors among adults. Theoretical models of suicide suggest that the presence of painful experiences such as CM-ACEs increase the risk of suicidal behaviors. The relation between child maltreatment, post-traumatic stress symptom clusters (PTSS) and suicidal behaviors has not been explicitly examined among youth. The present study examined the relations between CM-ACEs, PTSS clusters, and suicidal behaviors in a clinical population of children. Children, male, ages 6 to 14, enrolled in a residential treatment program completed self-report measures to evaluate variables of interest. Path analyses revealed statistically significant direct effects of CM-ACEs and PTSS clusters on suicidal behaviors. Significant total indirect effects and marginally significant individual indirect effects of intrusion and avoidance symptoms were observed for the relation between CM-ACEs and suicidal behavior. Findings suggest that symptoms associated with specific PTSS clusters might help explain the relation between CM-ACEs and suicidal behavior, and therefore, present important implications for clinical practice and future research.

Pathways from child maltreatment to proactive and reactive aggression: The role of posttraumatic stress symptom clusters.

OBJECTIVE: Childhood aggression is related to a myriad of negative concurrent and long-term outcomes. To mitigate the risks associated with childhood aggression, it is important to understand risk factors that might predispose 1 to aggressive behaviors. One risk factor commonly associated with aggression is the experience of child maltreatment. A common outcome associated with child maltreatment is the development of posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS). Several prevailing theoretical models of both posttraumatic stress and aggression indicate that these constructs have similar underlying cognitive, behavioral, and emotional mechanisms. Therefore, the present study examined the relations between and among child maltreatment, PTSS clusters, and proactive and reactive aggression in children. METHOD: Children between the ages of 6 and 14 who were enrolled in a residential treatment program completed self-report measures to evaluate variables of interest. These variables were included as multiple outcomes in a path analysis model in which individual PTSS clusters were examined as potential multiple mediators of the relations between child maltreatment and proactive and reactive aggression. RESULTS: Direct effects of child maltreatment and PTSS clusters on aggression were observed. Significant indirect effects of the intrusion PTSS cluster on the relation between child maltreatment and reactive aggression was found. CONCLUSIONS: Findings suggest that symptoms associated with these specific PTSS clusters might help explain the relation between child maltreatment and reactive aggression and therefore present important implications for clinical practice and future research. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Portable Interactive Pulse Tactile Recorder and Player System.

Pulse palpation is an effective method for diagnosing arterial diseases. However, most pulse measurement devices use preconfigured pressures to collect pulse signals, and most pulse tactile simulators can only display standard or predefined pulse waveforms. Here, a portable interactive human pulse measurement and reproduction system was developed that allows users to take arbitrary pulses and experience realistic simulated pulse tactile feedback in real time by using their natural pulse-taking behaviors. The system includes a pulse tactile recorder and a pulse tactile player. Pulse palpation forces and vibrations can be recorded and realistically replayed for later tactile exploration and examination. To retain subtle but vital pulse information, empirical mode decomposition was used to decompose pulse waveforms into several intrinsic mode functions. Artificial neural networks were then trained based on intrinsic mode functions to determine the relationship between the driving signals of the pulse tactile player and the resulting vibration waveforms. Experimental results indicate that the average normalized root mean square error and the average R-squared values between the reproduced and original pulses were 0.0654 and 0.958 respectively, which indicate that the system can reproduce high-fidelity pulse tactile vibrations.

Usability study of multiple vibrotactile feedback stimuli in an entire virtual keyboard input.

With advances in information technology, people spend more time on touchscreen-based virtual keyboards than physical keyboards. However, typing on touchscreens usually lacks informative tactile feedback and anchoring references to locate the right keys, and thus requires more visual attention. Most prior tactile keyboard research used single stimulus pattern, which was not enough to recognize different keys. The purpose of this study was to investigate the usability of multiple vibrotactile feedback patterns in an entire virtual QWERTY keyboard input. A set of highly discriminable vibration patterns was designed and associated with different regions of a virtual keyboard to help users to locate the right keys. However, the number of stimulus patterns might also affect the typing performance. A user study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the multiple vibrotactile feedback. The results showed that an appropriate number of stimulus patterns provided higher typing speed, higher typing efficiency, and lower error rate.

Using high-dimensional features for high-accuracy pulse diagnosis.

Accurate pulse diagnosis is often based on extensive clinical experience. Recently, modern computer-aided pulse diagnostic methods have been developed to help doctors to quickly determine patients' physiological conditions. Most pulse diagnostic methods used low-dimensional feature vectors to classify pulse types. Therefore, some important but subtle pulse information might be ignored. In this study, a novel high-dimensional pulse classification method was developed to improve pulse diagnosis accuracy. To understand the underlying physical meaning or implications hidden in pulse discrimination, 71 pulse features were extracted from the time, spatial, and frequency domains to cover as much pulse information as possible. Then, Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was applied to extract the most representative components. Artificial neural networks were trained to classify 10 different pulse types. The results showed that PCA accounted for 95% of the total variances achieved the highest accuracy of 98.2% in pulse classification. The results also showed that pulse energy, local instantaneous characteristics, main frequency, and waveform complexity were the major factors determining pulse discriminability. This study demonstrated that using high-dimensional features could retain more pulse information and thus, effectively improve pulse diagnostic accuracy.

Comorbid Internalizing and Externalizing Symptoms Among Children with ADHD: The Influence of Parental Distress, Parenting Practices, and Child Routines.

Emotional/behavioral concerns are common among children with ADHD. Familial factors (e.g., parental adjustment, parenting behaviors) are linked to the presence of comorbid internalizing/externalizing symptoms among children with ADHD. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate a model that includes multiple familial variables and their direct and indirect effects on child emotional and behavioral problems among children with ADHD. Participants included parents of children (6-12 years of age; M = 8.87, SD = 1.92) with a diagnosis of ADHD (N = 300). Participants completed measures of child emotional/behavioral concerns, parental distress, routines, and parenting behaviors. Path analyses revealed direct effects for parental distress, parent behavior and routines on child adjustment, after controlling for the other variables. A significant indirect relation between parental distress, routines, and externalizing behavior was observed. These findings highlight one specific path through which parental distress appears to influence specific behavioral concerns that are commonly observed in children with ADHD.

Sluggish Cognitive Tempo and Behavioral Difficulties in Children with ADHD: Associations with Internalizing and Externalizing Symptoms.

Sluggish cognitive tempo (SCT) appears to be distinct from attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and unique patterns of association between SCT and comorbid symptoms have been reported in the literature. The current study examined the relation between environmental supports and comorbid concerns among children with high SCT. Parents of children (ages 6-12) with a diagnosis of ADHD and clinically elevated SCT (N = 126) completed measures of emotional/behavioral functioning, child routines, and parental adjustment. Regression analyses revealed that after controlling for child age and parental adjustment, Household and Daily Living routines were associated with lower levels of externalizing symptoms while Discipline routines were associated with higher levels of these symptoms, accounting for nearly 20% of the variance in the equation. The findings suggest that for children with ADHD and high SCT routines may play an important role as an environmental support for externalizing symptoms.

Rates of auxiliary is and are in African American English speaking children with specific language impairment following language treatment.

The purpose of this exploratory study is to examine rates of auxiliary is and are across dialect patterns produced by African American English with specific language impairment (AAE-SLI) children following language treatment. The following research question is asked: Do AAE-SLI children exhibit rates of auxiliary is and are across dialect patterns consistent with previous reports of typically developing children and adult AAE speakers? A pre-/post-test design was used to identify patterns in which auxiliary is and are were produced at significant levels. Individual performance was included to examine variable rates of use across patterns. Group and individual results suggest children used auxiliary is and are in dialect patterns at rates consistent with typically developing child and adult AAE speakers. We conclude that rates of use may contribute to evidence-based guidelines for morphological intervention with AAE-SLI children.

Youth-caregiver agreement on clinical high-risk symptoms of psychosis.

Early identification of individuals who will go on to develop schizophrenia is a difficult endeavor. The variety of symptoms experienced by clinical high-risk youth make it difficult to identify who will eventually develop schizophrenia in the future. Efforts are being made, therefore, to more accurately identify at-risk individuals and factors that predict conversion to psychosis. As in most assessments of children and adolescents, however, both youth and parental report of symptomatology and resulting dysfunction are important to assess. The goals of the current study were to assess the extent of cross-informant agreement on the Structured Interview for Prodromal Symptoms (SIPS), a widely-used tool employed to determine clinical high-risk status. A total of 84 youth-caregiver pairs participated. Youth and caregiver raters displayed moderate overall agreement on SIPS-rated symptoms. Both youth and caregiver ratings of youth symptomatology contributed significantly to predicting conversion to psychosis. In addition, youth age and quality of youth-caregiver relationships appear to be related to cross-informant symptom ratings. Despite differences on individual SIPS domains, the majority of dyads agreed on youth clinical high-risk status. Results highlight the potential clinical utility of using caregiver informants to determine youth psychosis risk.

The presentation of dermatoglyphic abnormalities in schizophrenia: a meta-analytic review.

Within a neurodevelopmental model of schizophrenia, prenatal developmental deviations are implicated as early signs of increased risk for future illness. External markers of central nervous system maldevelopment may provide information regarding the nature and timing of prenatal disruptions among individuals with schizophrenia. One such marker is dermatoglyphic abnormalities (DAs) or unusual epidermal ridge patterns. Studies targeting DAs as a potential sign of early developmental disruption have yielded mixed results with regard to the strength of the association between DAs and schizophrenia. The current study aimed to resolve these inconsistencies by conducting a meta-analysis examining the six most commonly cited dermatoglyphic features among individuals with diagnoses of schizophrenia. Twenty-two studies published between 1968 and 2012 were included. Results indicated significant but small effects for total finger ridge count and total A-B ridge count, with lower counts among individuals with schizophrenia relative to controls. Other DAs examined in the current meta-analysis did not yield significant effects. Total finger ridge count and total A-B ridge count appear to yield the most reliable dermatoglyphic differences between individuals with and without schizophrenia.

Premorbid multivariate markers of neurodevelopmental instability in the prediction of adult schizophrenia-spectrum disorder: a high-risk prospective investigation.

The authors examined whether multiple childhood indicators of neurodevelopmental instability known to relate to schizophrenia-spectrum disorders could predict later schizophrenia-spectrum outcomes. A standardized battery of neurological and intellectual assessments was administered to a sample of 265 Danish children in 1972, when participants were 10-13 years old. Parent psychiatric diagnoses were also obtained in order to evaluate the predictive strength of neurodevelopmental factors in combination with genetic risk. Adult diagnostic information was available for 244 members of the sample. Participants were grouped into three categories indicating level of genetic risk: children with a parent with schizophrenia (n=94); children with a parent with a non-psychotic mental health diagnosis (n=84); and children with a parent with no records of psychiatric hospitalization (n=66). Variables measured included minor physical anomalies (MPAs), coordination, ocular alignment, laterality, and IQ. Adult diagnoses were assessed through psychiatric interviews in 1992, as well as through a scan of the national psychiatric registry through 2007. Through a combination of multiple childhood predictors, the model correctly classified 73% (24 of 33) of the participants who eventually developed a schizophrenia-spectrum outcome in adulthood. Results suggest that, with replication, multivariate premorbid prediction could potentially be a useful complementary approach to identifying individuals at risk for developing a schizophrenia-spectrum disorder. Genetic risk, MPAs, and other markers of neurodevelopmental instability may be useful for comprehensive prediction models.