Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry最新文献

Psychosis in children and adolescents has been studied on a spectrum from (common) psychotic experiences to (rare) early-onset schizophrenia spectrum disorders. This research review looks at the state-of-the-art for research across the psychosis spectrum, from evidence on psychotic experiences in community and clinical samples of children and adolescents to findings from psychosis risk syndrome research, to evidence on early-onset psychotic disorders. The review also looks at new opportunities to capture psychosis risk in childhood and adolescence, including opportunities for early intervention, identifies important unanswered questions, and points to future directions for prevention research.

Background: Suicide attempts and deaths among children are increasing in the United States, yet suicide in this preadolescent population remains understudied. A clearer understanding of which youth experience early onset of suicidal behavior is crucial for predicting risk and identifying youth best suited to early intervention. This paper examines how intersectional marginalized identities may predict the onset of suicidal behaviors among preadolescent youth.

Methods: The Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study is a prospective cohort study with annual assessments of youth ages 9 and 10 and their caregivers. Lifetime suicide attempts and preparatory suicidal behaviors were assessed annually. Survival models examined overall trends and demographic differences in the onset of suicidal behaviors.

Results: The final sample included 11,223 participants (mean age = 9.9 years old, SD = 7.5 months). 5,280 (47%) reported a minoritized racial/ethnic identity, and 1,410 (12.6%) were categorized as sexual or gender minorities. 208 suicide attempts and 143 instances of preparatory suicidal behaviors were reported across the study period. An interaction effect was found such that youth who hold multiple minoritized identities (i.e., sexual and gender minority youth from minoritized racial/ethnic backgrounds) were at elevated risk for onset of both suicide attempts (HR = 2.97, 95% CI = 1.59-5.56, p = .001) and preparatory suicidal behaviors (b = 3.09, 95% CI = 1.38-6.93, p = .006).

Conclusions: Intersectional marginalized identities were associated with earlier onset of suicide attempts and preparatory suicidal behaviors. Findings suggest that early interventions for minoritized youth may be important to reduce the rapidly increasing suicide rate among preadolescent youth.

Background: Numerous studies have investigated the associations between the home literacy environment (HLE) and children's word reading skills. However, these associations may partly reflect shared genetic factors since parents provide both the reading environment and their child's genetic predisposition to reading. Hence, the relationship between the HLE and children's reading is genetically confounded. To address this, parents' reading abilities have been suggested as a covariate, serving as a proxy for genetic transmission. The few studies that have incorporated this covariate control have made no distinction between the HLE reported by each parent or controlled for different skills in parents and children. We predicted children's reading development over time by the reading abilities of both parents as covariates and both parents' self-reported HLE as predictors.

Methods: We analyzed data from 242 unrelated children, 193 mothers, and 144 fathers. Children's word reading was assessed in Grades 1 and 3, and parents' word reading was assessed on a single occasion. Predictors of children's reading development included literacy resources and shared reading activities.

Results: Children's reading in Grade 3 was predicted by mothers' engagement in reading activities and by literacy resources at home, even after controlling for the genetic proxy of parental reading abilities. The longitudinal rate of change from Grades 1 to 3 was not associated with the HLE or parental reading.

Conclusions: Our finding that parental reading skills predicted children's word reading beyond children's initial word reading underscores the importance of considering genetic confounding in research on the home environment. Beyond parental reading abilities, children's skills were predicted by literacy resources in the home and by how often mothers engage in reading activities with their children. This suggests true environmental effects.

A diverse body of research conducted since the start of Covid-19 has investigated the impact of the pandemic on children's environments and their language development. This scoping review synthesises the peer-reviewed research literature on this topic between 2020 and 2023. Following the Joanna Briggs Institute methodology and the PRISMA extension for scoping reviews, we searched five databases for studies that fulfilled the following inclusion criteria: studies with neurotypical (monolingual or multilingual) 0-6-year-old children; studies focusing on any area of language development, including sources describing literacy or educational practices that impacted language development; studies focusing in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, with no restrictions of geographical location or language used by participants. Ninety-four eligible studies were identified for review. The extracted data were synthesised using frequency tables and narrative descriptions. Eligible studies used a wide range of data collection periods, methods, research sites, sample ages, sizes, and roles to fulfil 15 broad aims. They show that children's language-learning environments were significantly impacted, with variability over time and across the socioeconomic spectrum. Together they investigated diverse language domains, as well as several home, educational, and demographic factors that were hypothesised to impact children's language development. Of those studies that focused on language outcomes, most converge to suggest a decline in typical expectations of children's language development, including their social communication, vocabulary, morphosyntax, literacy, and language of schooling, as well as general communication skills, school readiness, and other areas of academic progress. Our synthesis suggests that children's language and environment were significantly impacted by COVID-19. This scoping review will support families, researchers, practitioners, and policymakers working with pandemic-era children to further understand the effects of the pandemic on children's development.

Social media have drastically changed the context of adolescent development. To date, the majority of research investigating the effects of these changes has measured time spent on social media, yielding inconclusive results—likely because this approach conceptualizes social media as a monolith. Social media experiences are complex and diverse, as are adolescents themselves. Emerging research has identified several specific components of social media that have varied associations with adolescent mental health, as well as individual difference factors that may alter these associations across adolescents. In this annual research review, we synthesize evidence regarding heterogeneity in social media effects related to (a) specific components of social media and (b) adolescents' individual differences regarding social media use and effects. We first focus on the specific social media components—content, features, and functions—that may be especially relevant for adolescent development. These include functions designed to foster relationships and social connections (e.g., social media feeds, ‘friends’), hateful content, notifications, risky content, and algorithmically curated content, among others. Next, we provide an overview of for whom these effects may matter most. We review research on individual differences that may explain some heterogeneity in social media effects, including gender/sex, age, marginalized status, neurobiological and social sensitivities, and other preexisting vulnerabilities to mental health concerns. The nascent work in these areas suggests many specific constructs and considerations that could drive future research examining nuanced and precise questions that go beyond ‘screen time’. We discuss avenues for researchers to leverage methodological advancements and address how specific social media experiences and individual differences shape developmental outcomes.