Early childhood predictors of low ‐income boys’ pathways to antisocial behavior in childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood

ABSTRACT Guided by a bridging model of pathways leading to low‐income boys’ early starting and persistent trajectories of antisocial behavior, the current article reviews evidence supporting the model from early childhood through early adulthood. Using primarily a cohort of 310 low‐income boys of families recruited from Women, Infants, and Children Nutrition Supplement centers in a large metropolitan area followed from infancy to early adulthood and a smaller cohort of boys and girls followed through early childhood, we provide evidence supporting the critical role of parenting, maternal depression, and other proximal family risk factors in early childhood that are prospectively linked to trajectories of parent‐reported conduct problems in early and middle childhood, youth‐reported antisocial behavior during adolescence and early adulthood, and court‐reported violent offending in adolescence. The findings are discussed in terms of the need to identify at‐risk boys in early childhood and methods and platforms for engaging families in healthcare settings not previously used to implement preventive mental health services.
Source: Infant Mental Health Journal - Category: Child Development Authors: Tags: ARTICLE Source Type: research