Adolescent resiliency to family adversity.

The factors associated with adolescent resiliency to childhood adversity were examined in a birth cohort of 940 New Zealand adolescents studied to the age of 16 years. Resilient teenagers were defined by: (a) high exposure to family adversity during childhood and (b) an absence of a wide range of externalising problems during adolescence including substance abuse, juvenile offending and school problems. Resilient teenagers were characterised by significantly higher IQ (p < .001), lower novelty seeking (p < .01) and lower affiliations with delinquent peers (p < .005) with these factors acting accumulatively to influence the probability of resilience to externalising problems.

[1]  M. Rutter,et al.  Juvenile Delinquency: Trends and Perspectives , 1984 .

[2]  P. Wyman,et al.  Parent and child views of parent-child relationship qualities and resilient outcomes among urban children. , 1993, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[3]  R. Bradley,et al.  Early indications of resilience and their relation to experiences in the home environments of low birthweight, premature children living in poverty. , 1994, Child development.

[4]  L J Horwood,et al.  Confirmatory factor models of attention deficit and conduct disorder. , 1991, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[5]  G R Patterson,et al.  A developmental perspective on antisocial behavior. , 1989, The American psychologist.

[6]  S. Luthar,et al.  Vulnerability and competence: a review of research on resilience in childhood. , 1991, The American journal of orthopsychiatry.

[7]  S. Casswell,et al.  A longitudinal study of New Zealand children's experience with alcohol. , 1991, British journal of addiction.

[8]  M. Schmidt,et al.  Familial adversities and child psychiatric disorders. , 1991, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[9]  M. Drake.  Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (3rd ed. rev.) , 1988 .

[10]  J. Wallerstein,et al.  Surviving The Breakup: How Children And Parents Cope With Divorce , 1980 .

[11]  A. Tellegen,et al.  Competence and stress in school children: the moderating effects of individual and family qualities. , 1988, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[12]  R. Catalano,et al.  Risk and protective factors for alcohol and other drug problems in adolescence and early adulthood: implications for substance abuse prevention. , 1992, Psychological bulletin.

[13]  A. Pickles,et al.  Partners, peers, and pathways: Assortative pairing and continuities in conduct disorder , 1993, Development and Psychopathology.

[14]  L. Cronbach.  Coefficient alpha and the internal structure of tests , 1951 .

[15]  D. Fergusson,et al.  The role of adolescent peer affiliations in the continuity between childhood behavioral adjustment and juvenile offending , 1996, Journal of abnormal child psychology.

[16]  Phil A. Silva,et al.  Self-reported delinquency: Results from an instrument for New Zealand* , 1988 .

[17]  S. Casswell,et al.  Drinking context and other influences on the drinking of 15-year-old New Zealanders. , 1992, British journal of addiction.

[18]  B. Egolf,et al.  Resilient early school-age children from maltreating homes: outcomes in late adolescence. , 1994, The American journal of orthopsychiatry.

[19]  M. Dunn,et al.  Chronic family adversity and early child behavior problems: a longitudinal study of low income families. , 1994, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[20]  M. Rutter,et al.  Education, Health and Behaviour , 1970 .

[21]  D. Fergusson,et al.  The effects of parental separation, the timing of separation and gender on children's performance on cognitive tests. , 1994, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[22]  D. Stone,et al.  Recent trends in the prevalence and secondary prevention of Down's syndrome. , 1989, Paediatric and perinatal epidemiology.

[23]  E. Werner,et al.  High-risk children in young adulthood: a longitudinal study from birth to 32 years. , 1989, The American journal of orthopsychiatry.

[24]  P. Wyman,et al.  Developmental and family milieu correlates of resilience in urban children who have experienced major life stress , 1991, American journal of community psychology.

[25]  L. Cronbach,et al.  Time-limit tests: Estimating their reliability and degree of speeding , 1951, Psychometrika.

[26]  Cloninger Cr.  A systematic method for clinical description and classification of personality variants: A proposal. , 1987 .

[27]  Robert Plomin,et al.  Development, genetics, and psychology , 1986 .

[28]  H. White,et al.  Towards the assessment of adolescent problem drinking. , 1989, Journal of studies on alcohol.

[29]  C. Conners,et al.  A teacher rating scale for use in drug studies with children. , 1969, The American journal of psychiatry.

[30]  P. Allison,et al.  How marital dissolution affects children: Variations by age and sex. , 1989 .

[31]  P. Amato,et al.  Parental divorce and the well-being of children: a meta-analysis. , 1991, Psychological bulletin.

[32]  Gordon Parker,et al.  The parental bonding instrument , 1979 .

[33]  A. Sameroff,et al.  Child and family factors that ameliorate risk between 4 and 13 years of age. , 1992, Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

[34]  C. Conners,et al.  Symptom Patterns in Hyperkinetic, Neurotic, and Normal Children. , 1970 .

[35]  R. Loeber.  Development and risk factors of juvenile antisocial behavior and delinquency. , 1990 .

[36]  R. Loeber.  Natural Histories of Conduct Problems, Delinquency, and Associated Substance Use , 1988 .

[37]  K. O’leary,et al.  Marital discord and childhood behavior problems , 1980, Journal of abnormal child psychology.

[38]  M. Rutter,et al.  Resilience in the Face of Adversity , 1985, British Journal of Psychiatry.

[39]  D. Shaw,et al.  Chronic family adversity and school-age children's adjustment. , 1988, Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

[40]  D. Fergusson,et al.  The childhoods of multiple problem adolescents: a 15-year longitudinal study. , 1994, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[41]  M. Rutter,et al.  Cycles of disadvantage : a review of research , 1978 .

[42]  D. Kandel,et al.  Advancing Knowledge about the Onset of Delinquency and Crime , 1990 .

[43]  D. Fergusson,et al.  The prevalence and risk factors associated with abusive or hazardous alcohol consumption in 16-year-olds. , 1995, Addiction.

[44]  D. Fergusson,et al.  Structure of DSM-III-R criteria for disruptive childhood behaviors: confirmatory factor models. , 1994, Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

[45]  IQ as a protective factor for subjects at high risk for antisocial behavior. , 1988 .

[46]  J M Jenkins,et al.  Factors protecting children living in disharmonious homes: maternal reports. , 1990, Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

[47]  K. Daniel O'Leary,et al.  Children's perceptions of marital discord and behavior problems of boys and girls , 1982, Journal of abnormal child psychology.

[48]  M. Greenberg,et al.  The inventory of parent and peer attachment: Individual differences and their relationship to psychological well-being in adolescence , 1987, Journal of youth and adolescence.

[49]  L J Horwood,et al.  The Christchurch Child Development Study: a review of epidemiological findings. , 1989, Paediatric and perinatal epidemiology.

[50]  N. Martin,et al.  Testing a model for the genetic structure of personality: a comparison of the personality systems of Cloninger and Eysenck. , 1994, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[51]  S. Luthar,et al.  Annotation: methodological and conceptual issues in research on childhood resilience. , 1993, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[52]  D. Fergusson,et al.  The structure, stability and correlations of the trait components of conduct disorder, attention deficit and anxiety/withdrawal reports. , 1993, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[53]  Coping with family transitions: winners, losers, and survivors. , 1989 .