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Bidirectional Associations Between Parenting Behavior and Child Callous-Unemotional Traits: Does Parental Depression Moderate this Link?

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Abstract

The current study longitudinally examined bidirectional associations between callous-unemotional (CU) traits and parenting dimensions. This study extended the literature by examining whether parental depression moderated these relations in a pre-adolescent sample. Proposed relations were examined using a longitudinal sample of 120 aggressive children (59.6 % male) who were in the 4th grade (M = 10.56 years, SD = 0.56) at baseline and were followed annually over 4 years. A series of generalized estimating equation (GEE) models were used to examine proposed relations. At the first order level, corporal punishment (p < . 001) and poor supervision/monitoring predicted increases in CU traits (p = 0.03) however, the inverse relations were not found. Importantly, parental depression moderated the link between corporal punishment and CU traits. Specifically, at high levels of depression, corporal punishment was predictive of increases in CU traits, but was unrelated to CU traits at low levels of depression. These findings aid in our understanding of the link between corporal punishment and CU traits by highlighting conditions under which certain parenting behaviors have an impact on CU traits, which in turn, may have important intervention implications. Further clinical implications, limitations and future directions are discussed.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to acknowledge the following sources of funding that contributed to data collection: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (R49nCCR418569), National Institute of Drug Abuse (DA08453; DA16135) and the WT Grant Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of Tennessee, Austin Peay Building, Knoxville, TN, 37996, USA

    Amber Wimsatt Childs & Todd M. Moore

  2. University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS, USA

    Paula J. Fite

  3. University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL, USA

    John E. Lochman

  4. University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

    Dustin A. Pardini

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  1. Amber Wimsatt Childs
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  2. Paula J. Fite
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  3. Todd M. Moore
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  5. Dustin A. Pardini
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Correspondence to Amber Wimsatt Childs.

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Childs, A.W., Fite, P.J., Moore, T.M. et al. Bidirectional Associations Between Parenting Behavior and Child Callous-Unemotional Traits: Does Parental Depression Moderate this Link?. J Abnorm Child Psychol 42, 1141–1151 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-014-9856-y

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