Premium
Anger/frustration, task persistence, and conduct problems in childhood: a behavioral genetic analysis
Author(s) -
DeaterDeckard Kirby,
Petrill Stephen A.,
Thompson Lee A.
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
journal of child psychology and psychiatry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.652
H-Index - 211
eISSN - 1469-7610
pISSN - 0021-9630
DOI - 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2006.01653.x
Subject(s) - persistence (discontinuity) , anger , psychology , frustration , developmental psychology , temperament , conduct disorder , cognition , aggression , clinical psychology , social psychology , personality , psychiatry , geotechnical engineering , engineering
Background: Individual differences in conduct problems arise in part from proneness to anger/frustration and poor self‐regulation of behavior. However, the genetic and environmental etiology of these connections is not known. Method: Using a twin design, we examined genetic and environmental covariation underlying the well‐documented correlations between anger/frustration, poor attention regulation (i.e., task persistence), and conduct problems in childhood. Participants included 105 pairs of MZ twins and 154 pairs of same‐sex DZ twins (4–8 year olds). Independent observers rated child persistence and affect based on behavior during a challenging in‐home cognitive and literacy assessment. Teachers and parents provided reports of conduct problems. Results: Persistence, anger/frustration, and conduct problems included moderate heritable and nonshared environmental variance; conduct problems included moderate shared environmental variance as well. Persistence and anger/frustration had independent genetic covariance with conduct problems and nonshared environmental covariance with each other. Conclusions: The findings indicate genetically distinct though inter‐related influences linking affective and self‐regulatory aspects of temperament with behavior problems in childhood.