Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T10:43:33.120Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Behaviour problems in childhood and stressors in early adult life. I. A 20 year follow-up of London school children

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2009

L. A. Champion ,
G. Goodall  and
M. Rutter
L. A. Champion*
Affiliation:
MRC Child Psychiatry Unit, Institute of Psychiatry, London
G. Goodall
Affiliation:
MRC Child Psychiatry Unit, Institute of Psychiatry, London
M. Rutter
Affiliation:
MRC Child Psychiatry Unit, Institute of Psychiatry, London
*
1Address for correspondence: Dr L. A. Champion, Department of Psychiatry, University of Edinburgh, Kennedy Tower, Royal Edinburgh Hospital, Morningside Park, Edinburgh EH10 5HF.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Synopsis

The research presented in this paper examined the relationship between the presence of childhood behaviour problems and the rate of life events and difficulties in early adult life. Data are presented from a 20 year follow-up study of a sample of inner London school children first studied when they were aged 10. The key finding was that emotional or behavioural disturbance in childhood was associated with a marked increase in the rate of severely negative events and difficulties some two decades later. This increase was only obtained for stressors with severe negative impact of the type shown in previous investigations to be associated with the onset of psychiatric disorder. Additional results demonstrated that this main finding could not be accounted for by stressors that were a result of adult psychiatric disorder, by the respondent's own behaviour, or by continuing association with the family of origin. The need for a lifespan developmental approach to the well-established stressor-illness link is discussed.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Psychological Medicine , Volume 25 , Issue 2 , March 1995 , pp. 231 - 246
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bebbington, P. E., Sturt, E., Tennant, C. & Hurry, J. (1984). Misfortune and resilience: a community study of women. Psychological Medicine 14, 347–363.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Block, J. H., Block, J. & Gjerde, P. F. (1986). The personality of children prior to divorce: a prospective study. Child Development 57, 827–840.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bock, G. R. & Whelan, J. (eds.) (1991). The Childhood Environment and Adult Disease. Ciba Foundation, Symposium No. 156. Wiley: Chichester.Google Scholar
Brown, G. W. & Harris, T. (1978). The Social Origins of Depression: A Study of Psychiatric Disorder in Women. Tavistock Publications: London.Google Scholar
Brown, G. W. & Harris, T. O. (1986). Establishing causal links: the Bedford College studies of depression. In Life Events and Psychiatric Disorders: Controversial Issues (ed. Katschnig, H.), pp. 107–187. Cambridge University Press: London.Google Scholar
Brown, G. W. & Harris, T. O. (1989). Life events and measurement. In Life Events and Illness (ed. Brown, G. W. and Harris, T. O.), pp. 3–45. Unwin Hyman: London.Google Scholar
Brown, G. W. & Prudo, R. (1981). Psychiatric disorder in a rural and an urban population. I. Aetiology of depression. Psychological Medicine 11, 581–599.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown, G. W. & Rutter, M. (1966). The measurement of family activities and relationships: a methodological study. Human Relations 19, 241–263.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown, G. W., Andrews, B., Bifulco, A. & Veiel, H. (1990 a). Self-esteem and depression. I. Measurement issues and prediction of onset. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology 25, 200–209.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brown, G. W., Bifulco, A., Veiel, H. O. F. & Andrews, B. (1990 b). Self-esteem and depression. II. Social correlates of self-esteem. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology 25, 225–234.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brown, G. W., Bifulco, A. & Andrews, B. (1990 c). Self-esteem and depression. III. Aetiological issues. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology 25, 235–243.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Brugha, T., Bebbington, P., Tennant, C. & Hurry, J. (1985). The list of threatening experiences: a subset of 12 life event categories with considerable long-term contextual threat. Psychological Medicine 15, 189–294.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Campbell, E. A., Cope, S. J. & Teasdale, J. D. (1983). Social factors and affective disorder: an investigation of Brown and Harris's model. British Journal of Psychiatry 143, 548–553.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Champion, L. (1990). The relationship between social vulnerability and the occurrence of severely threatening life events. Psychological Medicine 20, 157–161.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cherlin, A. J., Furstenberg, F. F. Jr., Chase-Lansdale, P. L., Kiernan, K. E., Robins, P. K., Morrison, D. R. & Teitler, J. O. (1991). Longitudinal studies of effects of divorce on children in Great Britain and the United States. Science 252, 1386–1389.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Costello, C. G. (1982). Social factors associated with depression: a retrospective community study. Psychological Medicine 12, 329–339.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Harris, T., Brown, G. W. & Bifulco, A. (1986). Loss of parent in childhood and adult psychiatric disorder: the role of lack of adequate parental care. Psychological Medicine 16, 641–659.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Harris, T., Brown, G. W. & Bifulco, A. (1987). Loss of parent in childhood and adult psychiatric disorder: the role of social class position and premarital pregnancy. Psychological Medicine 17, 163–183.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Harris, T., Brown, G. W. & Bifulco, A. (1990). Loss of parent in childhood and adult psychiatric disorder: a tentative overall model. Development and Psychopathology 2, 311–327.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katschnig, H. (1986). Measuring life stress, a comparison of the checklist and panel techniques. In Life Events and Psychiatric Disorder: Controversial Issues (ed. Katchnig, H.), pp. 107–187. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.Google Scholar
Kessler, R. C. & Magee, W. J. (1993). Childhood adversities and adult depression: basic patterns of association in a US national survey. Psychological Medicine 23, 679–690.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maughan, B. (1989). Growing up in the inner city: findings from the inner London longitudinal study. Paediatric and Perinatal Epidemiology 3, 195–215.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Neilson, E., Brown, G. W. & Marmot, M. (1989). Myocardial infarction. In Life Events and Illness (ed. Brown, G. W. and Harris, T. O.), pp. 313–360. Unwin Hyman: London.Google Scholar
Parry, G. & Shapiro, D. A. (1986). Social support and life events in working class women: stress buffering or independent effects? Archives of General Psychiatry 43, 315–323.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Parry, G., Shapiro, D. & Davies, L. (1981). Reliability of life-event ratings: an independent replication. British Journal of Clinical Psychology 20, 133–134.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quinton, D. & Rutter, M. (1988). Parenting Breakdown: The Making and Breaking of Intergenerational Links. Avebury: Aldershot.Google Scholar
Quinton, D., Pickles, A., Maughan, B. & Rutter, M. (1993). Partners, peers and pathways: assortative pairing and continuities in conduct disorder. Development and Psychopathology 5, 763–783.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robins, L. N. (1966). Deviant Children Grown Up: A Sociological and Psychiatric Study of Sociopathic Personality. Williams and Wilkins: Baltimore.Google Scholar
Robins, L. N. (1978). Sturdy childhood predictors of antisocial behaviour: replications from longitudinal studies. Psychological Medicine 8, 611–622.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Robins, L. N. (1986). The consequence of conduct disorder in girls. In Development of Antisocial and Prosocial Behaviour: Research, Theories and Issues (ed. Olweus, D., Block, J. and Radke-Yarrow, M.), pp. 385–414. Academic Press: New York.Google Scholar
Robins, L. N. & McEvoy, L. (1990). Conduct problems as predictors of substance abuse. In Straight and Devious Pathways from Childhood to Adulthood (ed. Robins, L. N. and Rutter, M.), pp. 182–204. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.Google Scholar
Robins, L. N. & Rutter, M. (eds.) (1990). Straight and Devious Pathways from Childhood to Adulthood. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.Google Scholar
Rodgers, G. (1990). Influences of early-life and recent factors on affective disorder in women: an exploration of vulnerability models. In Straight and Devious Pathways from Childhood to Adulthood (ed. Robins, L. and Rutter, M.), pp. 314–328. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.Google Scholar
Rodgers, B. (1991). Models of stress: vulnerability and affective disorder. Journal of Affective Disorder 21, 1–14.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rowe, D. C., Woulbroun, J. & Gulley, B. L. (1994). Peers and friends as nonshared environmental influences. In Separate Social Worlds of Siblings (ed. Hetherington, E. M., Reiss, D. and Plomin, R.), pp. 159–173. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates: Hillsdale, NJ.Google Scholar
Rutter, M. (1967). A children's behaviour questionnaire for completion by teachers: preliminary findings. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 8, 1–11.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rutter, M. (1986). Meyerian psychobiology, personality development and the role of life experiences. American Journal of Psychiatry 143, 1077–1087.Google ScholarPubMed
Rutter, M. (1989). Pathways from childhood to adult life. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 30, 23–51.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rutter, M. (1994). Continuities, transitions and turning points in development. In Development through Life: A Handbook for Clinicians (ed. Rutter, M. and Hay, D. F.), pp. 000–000. Blackwell Scientific Publications: Oxford.Google Scholar
Rutter, M. (1995). Beyond longitudinal data: causes, consequences, changes and continuity. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology (in the press).Google Scholar
Rutter, M. & Brown, G. W. (1966). The reliability and validity of measures of family life and relationships in families containing a psychiatric patient. Social Psychiatry 1, 38–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rutter, M. & Madge, N. (1976). Cycles of Disadvantage: A Review of Research. Heinemann Educational: London.Google Scholar
Rutter, M. & Sandberg, S. (1992). Psychosocial stressors: concepts, causes and effects. European Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 1, 3–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rutter, M., Yule, W., Berger, M., Yule, B., Morton, J. & Bagley, C. (1974). Children of West Indian immigrants. I. Rates of behavioural deviance and of psychiatric disorder. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 15, 241–262.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rutter, M., Cox, A., Tupling, C., Berger, M. & Yule, W. (1975 a). Attainment and adjustment in two geographical areas. I. The prevalence of psychiatric disorder. British Journal of Psychiatry 17, 35–56.Google Scholar
Rutter, M., Yule, B., Quinton, D., Rowlands, O., Yule, W. & Berger, M. (1975 b). Attainment and adjustment in two geographical areas. III. Some factors accounting for area differences. British Journal of Psychiatry 126, 520–533.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rutter, M., Champion, L., Quinton, D., Maughan, B. & Pickles, A. (1995). Origins of individual differences in environmental risk exposure. In Perspectives on the Ecology of Human Development (ed. Moen, P., Elder, G. and Luscher, K.). Cornell University Press: Ithaca.Google Scholar
St Claire, L. & Osborn, A. F. (1987). The ability and behaviour of children who have been lsquo;in care’ or separated from their parents. Early Child Development and Care 28, Monograph No. 3.Google Scholar
Sampson, R. J. & Laub, J. H. (1993). Crime in the Making: Pathways and Turning Points through Life. Harvard University Press: Cambridge, Mass.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sandberg, S., Rutter, M., Giles, S., Owen, A., Champion, L., Nicholls, J., Prior, V., McGuinness, D. & Drinnan, D. (1993). Assessment of psychosocial experiences in childhood: methodoligical issues and some illustrative findings. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 34, 879–897.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shepherd, M., Oppenheim, B. & Mitchell, S. (eds.) (1971). Childhood Behaviour and Mental Health. University of London Press: London.Google Scholar
Tennant, C. & Andrews, G. (1976). A scale to measure the stress of life events in Australia and New Zealand. Journal of Psychiatry 11, 163–167.Google Scholar
Tennant, C., Smith, A., Bebbington, P. & Hurry, J. (1979). The contextual threat of life events: the concept and its reliability. Psychological Medicine 9, 525–528.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Zoccolillo, M., Pickles, A., Quinton, D. & Rutter, M. (1992). The outcome of childhood conduct disorder: implications for defining adult personality disorder and conduct disorder. Psychological Medicine 22, 971–986.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed