Adolescence is a period of substantial maturation in brain regions underlying Executive Functioning (EF). Adolescence is also associated with initiation and escalation of Alcohol Use (AU), and adolescent AU has been proposed to produce physiological and neurobiological events that derail healthy EF development. However, support has been mixed, which may be due to (1) failure to consider co-occurring externalizing symptoms (including other drug use) and poor social adaptation, and (2) heterogeneity and psychometric limitations in EF measures. We aimed to clarify the AU-EF association by: (1) distinguishing general externalizing symptoms from specific symptoms (AU, aggression, drug use) using bifactor modeling, (2) testing prospective associations between general externalizing symptoms and specific symptoms, and task-general EF, as indexed by a well-validated computational modeling framework (diffusion decision model), and (3) examining indirect pathways from externalizing symptoms to deficits in task-general EF through poor social adaptation. A high-risk longitudinal sample (N = 919) from the Michigan Longitudinal Study was assessed at four time-points spanning early adolescence (10–13 years) to young adulthood (22–25). Results suggested a critical role of social adaptation within peer and school contexts in promoting healthy EF. There was no evidence that specific, neurotoxic effects of alcohol or drug use derailed task-general EF development.

Parenting can protect against the development of, or increase risk for, child psychopathology; however, it is unclear if parenting is related to psychopathology symptoms in a specific domain, or to broad liability for psychopathology. Parenting differs between and within families, and both overall family-level parenting and the child-specific parenting a child receives may be important in estimating transdiagnostic associations with psychopathology. Data come from a cross-sectional epidemiological sample (N = 10,605 children ages 4–17, 6434 households). Parents rated child internalizing and externalizing symptoms and their parenting toward each child. General and specific (internalizing, externalizing) psychopathology factors, derived with bifactor modeling, were regressed on parenting using multilevel modeling. Less warmth and more aversive/inconsistent parenting in the family, and toward an individual child relative to family average, were associated with higher general psychopathology and specific externalizing problems. Unexpectedly, more warmth in the family, and toward an individual child relative to family average, was associated with higher specific internalizing problems in 4–11 (not 12–17) year-olds. Less warmth and more aversive/inconsistent parenting are broad correlates of child psychopathology. Aversive/inconsistent parenting, is also related to specific externalizing problems. Parents may behave more warmly when their younger children have specific internalizing problems, net of overall psychopathology.