Citation

Larsson H, Viding E, Plomin R. Crim. Justice Behav. 2008; 35(2): 197-211.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2008, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/0093854807310225

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This study compared early parenting characteristics in children with different levels of callous--unemotional (CU) traits and antisocial behavior (AB). Four groups were formed on the basis of teacher assessments: high CU and low AB (CU+; N = 378), high CU and high AB (AB/CU+; N = 234), low CU and high AB (AB+; N = 210), and controls (N = 3,608). In addition, genetic and environmental influences on elevated levels of CU traits were specifically investigated in CU+ and AB/CU+ subgroups. Multivariate analysis of variance and DeFries-Fulker extremes analysis yielded three main findings: First, AB/CU+ and AB+ children exhibited higher levels of early negative parenting characteristics than CU+ children and controls. Second, these higher levels of negative parenting characteristics in AB/CU+ and AB+ children were explained by early child effects on parenting. Third, heritability estimates for CU in AB/CU+ and CU+ groups are of similar magnitude.

Keywords: Juvenile justice

Language: en