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Substantial research suggests that caregivers and families are powerful socialization agents when it comes to how youth process and regulate cognitive-affective information, which in turn can be a risk or resilience factor for various forms of developmental psychopathology. To this end, Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review features this special journal issue on the "Interplay of Family FactorsCognitive-Affective Processes in Youth." Featured articles review a wide array of methodologies and highlight numerous forms of cognitive-affective processing and family contextual factors. Multiple themes emerged across the twelve articles, emphasizing the need to examine (1) complex pathways within families, (2) the quality of cognitive-affective processes across individuals, (3) neurodevelopmental pathways linking socialization and cognitive-affective processes, (4) nuanced methods to assess "in-the-moment" cognitive-affective processes, (5) the impact of cultural background on how family factors intersect with youth cognitive-affective processes, and (6) the socialization of positive emotion. These papers showcase the applicability of this significant area of research for future efforts in prevention and intervention with youth at risk for, or already experiencing, some form of psychopathology.

Pediatric anxiety disorders are characterized by potentiated threat responses and maladaptive emotion regulation (ER). The Late Positive Potential (LPP) is a neural index of heightened attention to emotional stimuli. Anxious individuals typically exhibit a larger LPP to unpleasant stimuli, but the LPP may also be blunted to unpleasant and pleasant stimuli for those with co-morbid depression. While a larger LPP is thought to reflect greater emotional reactivity, it is unknown to what extent variation in the LPP to laboratory stimuli corresponds to daily emotional functioning. We assessed the LPP in the laboratory in response to unpleasant, pleasant, and neutral images in combination with ecological momentary assessment of emotional reactivity and regulation in daily life among youth (9-14years old; 55% female) with anxiety disorders (ANX, N=130) and no psychiatric diagnoses (ND, N=47). We tested whether LPP amplitudes to unpleasant and pleasant stimuli (vs. neutral) are greater in ANX (vs. ND) youth and whether LPP amplitudes inversely correlate with co-morbid depression symptoms. We also examined associations between the LPP and daily life emotional functioning among ANX and ND youth. We found no group-by-valence effects on LPP amplitudes. Within ANX youth, higher depression symptoms were associated with smaller LPP amplitudes to unpleasant, but not pleasant, stimuli relative to neutral stimuli. Larger LPP amplitudes to emotional (relative to neutral) stimuli were correlated with use of specific ER strategies among ANX and ND youth but not emotional reactivity. While the LPP may reflect initial emotional reactivity to laboratory stimuli, it is associated with ER behaviors, and not emotional reactivity, in daily life.

Adolescents' responses to negative social experiences can be influenced by parenting behaviors. This includes how parents react to their child's expression of emotions, an aspect of parenting referred to as emotion socialization. Emotion socialization may intersect with cultural values, particularly collectivism, a socially-relevant attitude that emphasizes the importance of interpersonal relationships. Examination of a neural measure called the feedback-related negativity (FRN), thought to reflect the degree to which feedback is experienced as aversive, could help elucidate neural contributions to and consequences of the role of collectivism in such family dynamics. Thus, this study examined whether adolescents' endorsement of collectivism moderated the association of parents' dismissive emotion socialization responses (called override responses) and FRN following peer rejection. A community sample of 83 Latinx (n = 32), Asian American (n = 20), and non-Latinx White (n = 31) adolescents ages 13-17 completed a computerized peer feedback task while continuous electroencephalogram was recorded. Their parents completed a battery of self-report questionnaires. Regression analyses demonstrated that adolescents' endorsement of collectivism moderated the association of override responses and FRN following peer rejection, such that FRN was enhanced as override responses increased for adolescents endorsing low and moderate levels of collectivism. Results suggest that there is cultural variation in the association of the emotion socialization strategy of override and adolescents' neural responses to socially-salient events. Findings have implications for parenting interventions designed to enhance adolescents' emotion regulation abilities.

Social anxiety disproportionately impacts individuals from certain cultural and developmental groups, namely those from Latinx and Asian American cultures and adolescents. Neural sensitivity to social feedback has been shown to vary across individuals and could contribute to this disparity by further exacerbating differences; thus, this could be an important phenomenon for understanding, preventing, and treating social anxiety. The goal of the present study was to examine the association of social anxiety with a neural correlate of feedback processing, the feedback-related negativity (FRN), and determine if there was a moderating effect of racial/ethnic group. A community sample of 104 Latinx (n=41), Asian American (n=24), and non-Latinx White (NLW; n=39) adolescents (ages 13-17) completed a computerized peer feedback task while continuous electroencephalogram was recorded. Social anxiety and FRN measures were differentially associated as a function of race/ethnicity. NLW adolescents demonstrated greater FRN responses to acceptance feedback as social anxiety increased, whereas FRN responses to both rejection and acceptance feedback were related to greater social anxiety for Asian American adolescents. Notably, the Latinx group showed the greatest FRN responses yet endorsed the least amount of social anxiety, with no relation between social anxiety and FRN detected. Results highlight cultural variation in the relation between neural correlates of self-regulatory processes and social anxiety. This information could guide culturally-informed models of social anxiety that adopt a multiple units of analysis framework.

OBJECTIVE: Examine the nature of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) symptoms nominated for treatment and investigate improvement in OCD symptom dimensions. METHOD: Youth with OCD (N = 71) participated in a clinical trial that compared exposure-based cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) to psychoeducation plus relaxation training (PRT). Participants completed a baseline assessment to characterize OCD severity. Next, parents and youth collaboratively developed an OCD symptom treatment hierarchy. Afterward, these symptoms were independently re-assessed at each session by youth and parents. After 12 sessions, a post-treatment assessment was completed by independent evaluators. RESULTS: A greater incidence of baseline aggressive/checking symptoms predicted a positive CBT treatment response. For parent ratings of youth distress, CBT outperformed PRT across symptom dimensions, but hoarding symptoms exhibited a slower rate of improvement relative to other dimensions across treatments. For youth distress ratings, CBT outperformed PRT across most symptom dimensions. While symmetry/ordering symptoms exhibited a slower rate of improvement relative to other dimensions across treatments, post-hoc tests found no difference in the average distress rating for symmetry/ordering symptoms between treatment groups. Finally, across symptom dimensions, parents reported a linear reduction in youth distress whereas youth experienced a non-linear reduction in distress that diminished over treatment. CONCLUSION: Exposure-based CBT is beneficial for OCD symptoms, and remains the principle treatment for pediatric OCD. However, as symmetry/ordering symptoms exhibited improvement from CBT and PRT, there is some shared treatment mechanisms that improves these symptoms. Finally, as youth perceive diminishing distress reduction over time, clinicians are encouraged to employ appropriate reinforcement strategies in treatment.

Task persistence is an important learning-related behavior associated with academic success. Although persistence has been related to motivational beliefs and cognitive skills, these constructs are typically studied independently, limiting our understanding of relations among them. The current investigation was designed to understand how these concepts related in early elementary school, a developmental period characterized by high motivational beliefs, growth in cognitive control, and the transition to school. Interest, perceived competence, and response inhibition were evaluated as predictors of children’s (N=73, Mage= 6.91 years) likelihood to demonstrate high persistence on a challenging puzzle task. Results provided evidence that motivational constructs are not sufficient for understanding differences in persistent behavior during this developmental period. Specifically, relations between interest and perceived competence and task persistence were only present for children with moderate to high response inhibition skills. Moreover, gender differences in task persistence emerged, indicating that while interest and perceived competence motivated all students to exhibit persistence, girls were still more likely to demonstrate task persistence than boys. Overall, findings suggest that task persistence in elementary school is a complex behavior that requires both cognitive control skills to support engagement and the motivation to continue engaging as task difficulty increases.

Infants' emerging ability to move independently by crawling is associated with changes in multiple domains, including an increase in expressions of anger in situations that block infants' goals, but it is unknown whether increased anger is specifically because of experience with being able to move autonomously or simply related to age. To examine the influence of locomotion on developmental change in anger, infants' (N = 20) anger expressions during an arm restraint procedure were observed longitudinally at a precrawling baseline assessment and 2 and 6 weeks after the onset of crawling. Infant age at each crawling stage was unrelated to the frequency of anger expressed in response to arm restraint. At 6 weeks postcrawling onset, infants whose mothers rated them as temperamentally higher in distress to limitations, compared with those rated lower, showed a greater increase in the frequency of anger expressed during the arm restraint relative to earlier assessments and took longer to reduce the frequency of anger expressed when no longer restrained. Findings suggest that experience with autonomous crawling has an effect on anger expression, independent of age, and that a temperamental tendency to become distressed by limitations may exacerbate the effect of crawling on anger expression.

The perceived salience of errors can be influenced by individual-level motivational factors. Specifically, those who endorse a high degree of collectivism, a cultural value that emphasizes prioritization of interpersonal relationships, may find errors occurring in a social context to be more aversive than individuals who endorse collectivism to a lesser degree, resulting in upregulation of a neural correlate of error-monitoring, the error-related negativity (ERN). This study aimed to identify cultural variation in neural response to errors occurring in a social context in a sample of diverse adolescents. It was predicted that greater collectivism would be associated with enhanced neural response to errors occurring as part of a team. Participants were 95 Latinx (n = 35), Asian American (n = 20) and non-Latinx White (n = 40) adolescents (ages 13–17) who completed a go/no-go task while continuous electroencephalogram was recorded. The task included social (team) and non-social (individual) conditions. ERN was quantified using mean amplitude measures. Regression models demonstrated that collectivism modulated neural response to errors occurring in a social context, an effect that was most robust for Latinx adolescents. Understanding cultural variation in neural sensitivity to social context could inform understanding of both normative and maladaptive processes associated with self-regulation.

Event-related potentials (ERP) waveforms are the summation of many overlapping signals. Changes in the peak or mean amplitude of a waveform over a given time period, therefore, cannot reliably be attributed to a particular ERP component of ex ante interest, as is the standard approach to ERP analysis. Though this problem is widely recognized, it is not well addressed in practice. Our approach begins by presuming that any observed ERP waveform - at any electrode, for any trial type, and for any participant - is approximately a weighted combination of signals from an underlying set of what we refer to as principle ERPs, or pERPs. We propose an accessible approach to analyzing complete ERP waveforms in terms of their underlying pERPs. First, we propose the principle ERP reduction (pERP-RED) algorithm for investigators to estimate a suitable set of pERPs from their data, which may span multiple tasks. Next, we provide tools and illustrations of pERP-space analysis, whereby observed ERPs are decomposed into the amplitudes of the contributing pERPs, which can be contrasted across conditions or groups to reveal which pERPs differ (substantively and/or significantly) between conditions/groups. Differences on all pERPs can be reported together rather than selectively, providing complete information on all components in the waveform, thereby avoiding selective reporting or user discretion regarding the choice of which components or windows to use. The scalp distribution of each pERP can also be plotted for any group/condition. We demonstrate this suite of tools through simulations and on real data collected from multiple experiments on participants diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Software for conducting these analyses is provided in the pERPred package for R.

As highlighted by Eisenberg, Cumberland, and Spinrad (1998), parents play a critical role in children's socioemotional development, in part, by shaping how children and adolescents process, respond to, and regulate their emotions (i.e., emotional reactivity/regulation). Although evidence for associations between parenting behavior and youth's emotional processing has relied primarily on behavioral measures of emotion, researchers have begun to examine how parenting is related to the neural substrates of youth's reactivity and regulation. This article reviews a growing literature linking parental behavior with structural brain development as well as functional activity and connectivity in neural regions supporting emotional reactivity/regulation during infancy, childhood, and adolescence. By focusing on normative parental behaviors, we evaluate the evidence for associations between typical variations in caregiving and neural processes thought to support youth's emotional reactivity/regulation. The purpose of this review is to (1) extend the model put forth by Eisenberg and colleagues to consider the ways that parenting behaviors are related to neural substrates of youth's emotional reactivity and regulation; (2) review the empirical evidence for associations between parenting, particularly parental "emotion-related socialization behaviors" (ERSBs), and neural substrates of youth's emotional reactivity/regulation; and (3) recommend future directions for this emerging area of research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

This chapter provides a clinically informed review of the available methods for assessing individual differences in young children’s emotional reactivity and regulation. Self-report and informant report as well as behavioral observations are reviewed in terms of strengths and challenges. The authors highlight the advantages of a multimethod approach for assessing temperamental influences on important developmental outcomes, including emotion regulation. A multimethod approach may produce more reliable measures and, critically, can advance our understanding of the development of emotion regulation and psychopathology. For example, multimethod assessment approaches are more amenable to statistical approaches that can quantify the effects of context on relations between temperament, emotion regulation, and developmental outcomes. If a multimethod approach that combines informant report and behavioral assessment methods is not feasible, it is especially important to choose a questionnaire or behavioral episode that is thought to elicit the temperamental dimensions and emotion regulation skills that are particularly relevant for certain disorders.

Author(s): Ladouceur, Cecile D; Tan, Patricia Z; Sharma, Vinod; Bylsma, Lauren M; Silk, Jennifer S; Siegle, Greg J; Forbes, Erika E; McMakin, Dana L; Dahl, Ronald E; Kendall, Phillip C; Mannarino, Anthony; Ryan, Neal D | Abstract: BACKGROUND:Anxiety disorders are associated with an overactive action monitoring system as indexed by a larger error-related negativity (ERN). This study tests whether ERN magnitude changes following treatment, predicts response to treatment, and varies by treatment type. METHODS:The sample included 130 youth (9-14nyears): youth with an anxiety disorder (ANX; nn=n100) and healthy control (HC; nn=n30) youth with no lifetime DSM-IV disorders. ANX youth were randomized to either a manualized cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT) or a comparison child-centered therapy (CCT). The ERN was assessed before and after 16 sessions of treatment and within a comparable interval for HC. Subjective ratings about making errors on the task were obtained following each testing session. The ClinicalTrials.gov identifier is NCT00774150. RESULTS:The ERN was larger in ANX than HC youth but ERN magnitude did not significantly change following treatment in the ANX youth, regardless of treatment type, and baseline ERN did not predict treatment response. Post-task ratings revealed that ANX youth worried more about task performance feedback than HC. Like the ERN, mean ratings did not significantly change following treatment. However, these ratings were not correlated with ERN amplitude. CONCLUSIONS:Findings of greater ERN in pediatric anxiety disorders are replicated in a larger sample. More importantly, findings from this randomized control trial show that a larger ERN and feeling worried about performance feedback remain unchanged following treatment and are unrelated to treatment response. Such findings suggest that action monitoring systems remain overactive in anxious youth treated with psychotherapy, suggesting the need for future investigation of whether novel complimentary cognitive and emotional training programs can modify these systems would be warranted.

Evidence of associations between obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and alterations in neural indices of performance monitoring, i.e., elevated neural activity following errors, have accelerated interest in the error-related negativity (ERN) as a biomarker for pediatric OCD. The study investigates the degree to which attention bias training is linked to changes in neural measures of performance monitoring (ERN, correct response negativity or CRN) and whether pre-to-post training changes in these neural indices are associated with symptom changes in youth with OCD. The sample included 36 youth (8-17 years) diagnosed with OCD who completed a 12-session attention training program and pre- and post-training EEG assessment of performance monitoring using cognitive and emotional flanker tasks. The emotional flanker task was individualized to each participant's negative ratings of stimuli at pre-treatment to enhance salience of threat-related stimuli across youth. Results indicated that unlike participants who received attentional control protocol (CON), those who received attentional bias modification protocol (ABM) showed significant attenuations in neural activity following erroneous and correct responses in the emotional flanker task. The ERN amplitude during the cognitive flanker task was unchanged in both ABM and CON groups. Attenuations in the ERN were also linked to decreases in social anxiety and depressive symptoms. Findings highlight the relevance of including emotionally-salient tasks when investigating potential neural mechanisms of treatments and suggest that alterations in neural processes underlying performance monitoring can be targeted via attention training programs in pediatric OCD.

Task persistence is an important learning-related behavior associated with academic success. Although persistence has been related to motivational beliefs and cognitive skills, these constructs are typically studied independently, limiting our understanding of relations among them. The current investigation was designed to understand how these concepts are related in early elementary school, a developmental period characterized by high motivational beliefs, growth in cognitive control, and the transition to school. Interest, perceived competence, and response inhibition were evaluated as predictors of children’s (N = 73, Mage = 6.91 years) likelihood to demonstrate high persistence on a challenging puzzle task. Results provided evidence that motivational constructs are not sufficient for understanding differences in persistent behavior during this developmental period. Specifically, relations between interest and perceived competence and task persistence were present only for children with moderate to high response inhibition skills. Moreover, gender differences in task persistence emerged, indicating that although interest and perceived competence motivated all students to exhibit persistence, girls were still more likely to demonstrate task persistence than boys. Overall, findings suggest that task persistence in elementary school is a complex behavior that requires both cognitive control skills to support engagement and the motivation to continue engaging as task difficulty increases.

Decreases in children's anger reactivity because of the onset of their autonomous use of strategies characterizes the prevailing model of the development of emotion regulation in early childhood (Kopp, 1989). There is, however, limited evidence of the varied pathways that mark this development and their proposed antecedents and consequences. This study used a person-centered approach to identify such pathways, antecedents, and outcomes. A sample of 120 children from economically strained rural and semirural households were observed while waiting to open a gift at ages 24, 36, and 48 months. Multitrajectory modeling of children's anger expressions and strategy use yielded three subgroups. As they aged, typically developing children's strategy use (calm bids and focused distraction) increased while anger expressions decreased. Later developing children, though initially elevated in anger expression and low in strategy use, demonstrated marked growth across indicators and did not differ from typically developing children at 48 months. At-risk children, despite developing calm bidding skills, did not display longitudinal self-distraction increases or anger expression declines. Some predicted antecedents (12–24 month child language skills and language-capitalizing parenting practices) and outcomes (age 5 years externalizing behavior) differentiated pathways. Findings illustrate how indicator-specific departures from typical pathways signal risk for behavior problems and point to pathway-specific intervention opportunities.

Pediatric trichotillomania (TTM) is an understudied condition that can be highly impairing; little is known about family environmental features that shape its development and course. We examined family functioning among age and gender-matched groups of youth with primary TTM (n = 30; mean age = 12.87), obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD; n = 30; mean age = 12.70), and no psychiatric history (healthy controls; HC; n = 30; mean age = 12.46). An additional group of n = 25 TTM cases was employed to examine relationships between TTM severity and family functioning. All youth completed standardized diagnostic assessment, including the Family Environment Scale (FES) and Children's Report of Parenting Behavior Inventory (CRPBI). Family functioning was more impaired among both TTM and OCD cases relative to controls, as evidenced by higher levels of child-reported FES conflict and lower cohesion, expressiveness, and organization. Less consistent findings emerged on parent report, with cohesion, but not conflict, distinguishing the HC and clinical groups. In keeping with prior research, parents of TTM-affected youth also reported lower expressiveness and cohesion than parents in the OCD group. There was limited evidence for links between hair-pulling severity and family impairment and no links to parenting behavior. Findings are discussed in terms of implications for family focused treatment.

Objective: Stimulant medication and behavior therapy are efficacious for youth with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). However, research suggests that stimulants may start and/or worsen sleep problems for youth. Further, the impact of behavior therapy for ADHD on sleep is unknown. This study examined the frequency of sleep problems and effects of stimulant medication, behavior therapy, and their combination on sleep problems in youth with ADHD. This study also explored the influence of dimensional baseline ratings of ADHD symptom subtype and psychiatric comorbidity on sleep outcomes. Methods: Participants were 576 children (aged 7-9 years) with ADHD-Combined type from the Multimodal Treatment of ADHD study that compared methylphenidate, behavior therapy, and their combination to community care. Before treatment, parents completed the Child Behavior Checklist used to derive a total sleep problems score. Parents also completed ratings of oppositionality and ADHD symptom severity, whereas youth completed ratings of depression and anxiety. These ratings were readministered after treatment. Results: General linear mixed-effects models were used to assess change in total sleep problems across treatment. The combined group exhibited a statistically significant reduction in total sleep problems (z = -5.81, p 0.99) did not reach statistical significance. Change in psychiatric symptoms did not significantly moderate change in total sleep problems by treatment assignment. Greater baseline oppositional defiant disorder severity predicted less reduction in total sleep problems, χ2(1) = 3.86, p

©, Copyright © Society of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology. This study compared individual cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and a supportive child-centered therapy (CCT) for child anxiety disorders on rates of treatment response and recovery at posttreatment and 1-year follow-up, as well as on real-world measures of emotional functioning. Youth (N = 133; ages 9–14) with anxiety disorders (generalized, separation, and/or social anxiety) were randomized using a 2:1 ratio to CBT (n = 90) or CCT (n = 43), which served as an active comparison. Treatment response and recovery at posttreatment and 1-year follow-up were assessed by Independent Evaluators, and youth completed ecological momentary assessment of daily emotions throughout treatment. The majority of youth in both CBT and CCT were classified as treatment responders (71.1% for CBT, 55.8% for CCT), but youth treated with CBT were significantly more likely to fully recover, no longer meeting diagnostic criteria for any of the targeted anxiety disorders and no longer showing residual symptoms (66.7% for CBT vs. 46.5% for CCT). Youth treated with CBT also reported significantly lower negative emotions associated with recent negative events experienced in daily life during the latter stages of treatment relative to youth treated with CCT. Furthermore, a significantly higher percentage of youth treated with CBT compared to CCT were in recovery at 1-year follow-up (82.2% for CBT vs. 65.1% for CCT). These findings indicate potential benefits of CBT above and beyond supportive therapy on the breadth, generalizability, and durability of treatment-related gains.

Author(s): Benoit Allen, Kristy; Silk, Jennifer S; Meller, Suzanne; Tan, Patricia Z; Ladouceur, Cecile D; Sheeber, Lisa B; Forbes, Erika E; Dahl, Ronald E; Siegle, Greg J; McMakin, Dana L; Ryan, Neal D | Abstract: BackgroundChildhood anxiety is associated with low levels of parental autonomy granting and child perceived control, elevated child emotional reactivity and deficits in child emotion regulation. In early childhood, low levels of parental autonomy granting are thought to decrease child perceived control, which in turn leads to increases in child negative emotion. Later in development, perceived control may become a more stable, trait-like characteristic that amplifies the relationship between parental autonomy granting and child negative emotion. The purpose of this study was to test mediation and moderation models linking parental autonomy granting and child perceived control with child emotional reactivity and emotion regulation in anxious youth.MethodsClinically anxious youth (Nn=n106) and their primary caregivers were assessed prior to beginning treatment. Children were administered a structured diagnostic interview and participated in a parent-child interaction task that was behaviorally coded for parental autonomy granting. Children completed an ecological momentary assessment protocol during which they reported on perceived control, emotional reactivity (anxiety and physiological arousal) and emotion regulation strategy use in response to daily negative life events.ResultsThe relationship between parental autonomy granting and both child emotional reactivity and emotion regulation strategy use was moderated by child perceived control: the highest levels of self-reported physiological responding and the lowest levels of acceptance in response to negative events occurred in children low in perceived control with parents high in autonomy granting. Evidence for a mediational model was not found. In addition, child perceived control over negative life events was related to less anxious reactivity and greater use of both problem solving and cognitive restructuring as emotion regulation strategies.ConclusionBoth parental autonomy granting and child perceived control play important roles in the everyday emotional experience of clinically anxious children.

© 2018 Tan, Silk, Dahl, Kronhaus and Ladouceur. This study sought to examine age-related differences in the influences of social (neutral, emotional faces) and non-social/non-emotional (shapes) distractor stimuli in children, adolescents, and adults. To assess the degree to which distractor, or task-irrelevant, stimuli of varying social and emotional salience interfere with cognitive performance, children (N = 12; 8-12y), adolescents (N = 17; 13-17y), and adults (N = 17; 18-52y) completed the Emotional Identification and Dynamic Faces (EIDF) task. This task included three types of dynamically-changing distractors: (1) neutral-social (neutral face changing into another face); (2) emotional-social (face changing from 0% emotional to 100% emotional); and (3) non-social/non-emotional (shapes changing from small to large) to index the influence of task-irrelevant social and emotional information on cognition. Results yielded no age-related differences in accuracy but showed an age-related linear reduction in correct reaction times across distractor conditions. An age-related effect in interference was observed, such that children and adults showed slower response times on correct trials with socially-salient distractors; whereas adolescents exhibited faster responses on trials with distractors that included faces rather than shapes. A secondary study goal was to explore individual differences in cognitive interference. Results suggested that regardless of age, low trait anxiety and high effortful control were associated with interference to angry faces. Implications for developmental differences in affective processing, notably the importance of considering the contexts in which purportedly irrelevant social and emotional information might impair, vs. improve cognitive control, are discussed.

Parenting is often implicated as a potential source of individual differences in youths' emotional information processing. The present study examined whether parental affect is related to an important aspect of adolescent emotional development, response to peer evaluation. Specifically, we examined relations between maternal negative affect, observed during parent-adolescent discussion of an adolescent-nominated concern with which s/he wants parental support, and adolescent neural responses to peer evaluation in 40 emotionally healthy and depressed adolescents. We focused on a network of ventral brain regions involved in affective processing of social information: the amygdala, anterior insula, nucleus accumbens, and subgenual anterior cingulate, as well as the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex. Maternal negative affect was not associated with adolescent neural response to peer rejection. However, longer durations of maternal negative affect were associated with decreased responsivity to peer acceptance in the amygdala, left anterior insula, subgenual anterior cingulate, and left nucleus accumbens. These findings provide some of the first evidence that maternal negative affect is associated with adolescents' neural processing of social rewards. Findings also suggest that maternal negative affect could contribute to alterations in affective processing, specifically, dampening the saliency and/or reward of peer interactions during adolescence. © 2014 The Authors.

SYNOPSIS Objective . This study examines how young children's emotion and behavior relate to maternal emotions concurrently and as a function of children's developmental changes in self-regulation. Design . Mothers and their children (N = 120) participated in an 8-min waiting task at children's ages 18, 24, 36, and 48 months. Children's emotion expressions, misbehavior, and regulatory efforts were observed, and mothers rated their own emotions during the wait. Results . Children's emotion and behavior and maternal emotions related in expected directions at most time points. Over time, maternal positive emotion increased more if children were less angry, more content, or more engaged in regulatory efforts relative to age mates. Maternal negative emotion decreased more if children engaged more in regulatory efforts but less if children were angrier relative to age mates. Conclusions . Individual differences in children's emotions may influence parental emotions. Over time, only the intra-individual decline ...

© 2016 Elsevier Ltd Do day-to-day emotions, social interactions, and sleep play a role in determining which anxious youth respond to supportive child-centered therapy (CCT) versus cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT)? We explored whether measures of day-to-day functioning (captured through ecological momentary assessment, sleep diary, and actigraphy), along with clinical and demographic measures, were predictors or moderators of treatment outcome in 114 anxious youth randomized to CCT or CBT. We statistically combined individual moderators into a single, optimal composite moderator to characterize subgroups for which CCT or CBT may be preferable. The strongest predictors of better outcome included: (a) experiencing higher positive affect when with one's mother and (b) fewer self-reported problems with sleep duration. The composite moderator indicated that youth for whom CBT was indicated had: (a) more day-to-day sleep problems related to sleep quality, efficiency, and waking, (b) day-to-day negative events related to interpersonal concerns, (c) more DSM-IV anxiety diagnoses, and (d) college-educated parents. These findings illustrate the value of both day-to-day functioning characteristics and more traditional sociodemographic and clinical characteristics in identifying optimal anxiety treatment assignment. Future studies will need to enhance the practicality of real-time measures for use in clinical decision making and evaluate additional anxiety treatments.

Background: Reviews have highlighted anxious youths’ affective disturbances, specifically, elevated negative emotions and reliance on ineffective emotion regulation strategies. However, no study has examined anxious youth’s emotional reactivity and regulation in real-world contexts. Methods: This study utilized an ecological momentary assessment approach to compare real-world emotional experiences of 65 youth with generalized anxiety disorder, social anxiety disorder, or social phobia (ANX) and 65 age-matched healthy controls (CON), ages 9–13 years. Results: Hierarchical linear models revealed that ANX reported higher levels of average past-hour peak intensity of nervous, sad and upset emotions than CON youth but similar levels during momentary reports of current emotion. As expected, ANX youth reported more frequent physiological reactions in response to a negative event; however, there were no group differences in how frequently they used cognitive–behavioral strategies. Avoidance, distraction and problem solving were associated with the down-regulation of all negative emotions except nervousness for both ANX and CON youth; however, group differences emerged for acceptance, rumination and physiological responding. Conclusions: In real-world contexts, ANX youth do not report higher levels of momentary negative emotions but do report heightened negative emotions in response to challenging events. Moreover, ANX youth report no differences in how frequently they use adaptive regulatory strategies but are more likely to have physiological responses to challenging events. They are also less effective at using some strategies to down-regulate negative emotion than CON youth.

Infants' emerging ability to move independently by crawling is associated with changes in multiple domains, including an increase in expressions of anger in situations that block infants' goals, but it is unknown whether increased anger is specifically because of experience with being able to move autonomously or simply related to age. To examine the influence of locomotion on developmental change in anger, infants' (N = 20) anger expressions during an arm restraint procedure were observed longitudinally at a precrawling baseline assessment and 2 and 6 weeks after the onset of crawling. Infant age at each crawling stage was unrelated to the frequency of anger expressed in response to arm restraint. At 6 weeks postcrawling onset, infants whose mothers rated them as temperamentally higher in distress to limitations, compared with those rated lower, showed a greater increase in the frequency of anger expressed during the arm restraint relative to earlier assessments and took longer to reduce the frequency of anger expressed when no longer restrained. Findings suggest that experience with autonomous crawling has an effect on anger expression, independent of age, and that a temperamental tendency to become distressed by limitations may exacerbate the effect of crawling on anger expression.

Individual cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) provides anxious youth with skills and experiences to increase "brave" behavior in the face of feared situations. This study addresses whether parental encouragement of bravery during an anxiety provoking and potentially avoidable naturalistic speech task (a) differs between parents of youth (ages 9-13) with anxiety disorders (N=47) and parents of healthy non-anxious controls (N=20); (b) influences response to treatment; and (c) changes during treatment for anxious youth randomized to receive CBT (N=30) or Child-Centered Therapy (CCT; a non-directive active comparison treatment; N=17). Parent-child dyads were videotaped during a discussion of whether or not the child should complete an optional speech task. Parents of anxious youth showed less encouragement of bravery than parents of controls. Encouragement of bravery increased from pre- to post-treatment for youth who received CBT but not CCT, and pre-treatment encouragement of bravery predicted a better response to treatment, particularly for youth receiving CBT.

Reviews have highlighted anxious youths' affective disturbances, specifically, elevated negative emotions and reliance on ineffective emotion regulation strategies. However, no study has examined anxious youth's emotional reactivity and regulation in real-world contexts.This study utilized an ecological momentary assessment approach to compare real-world emotional experiences of 65 youth with generalized anxiety disorder, social anxiety disorder, or social phobia (ANX) and 65 age-matched healthy controls (CON), ages 9-13 years.Hierarchical linear models revealed that ANX reported higher levels of average past-hour peak intensity of nervous, sad and upset emotions than CON youth but similar levels during momentary reports of current emotion. As expected, ANX youth reported more frequent physiological reactions in response to a negative event; however, there were no group differences in how frequently they used cognitive-behavioral strategies. Avoidance, distraction and problem solving were associated with the down-regulation of all negative emotions except nervousness for both ANX and CON youth; however, group differences emerged for acceptance, rumination and physiological responding.In real-world contexts, ANX youth do not report higher levels of momentary negative emotions but do report heightened negative emotions in response to challenging events. Moreover, ANX youth report no differences in how frequently they use adaptive regulatory strategies but are more likely to have physiological responses to challenging events. They are also less effective at using some strategies to down-regulate negative emotion than CON youth.

Being able to wait is an essential part of self-regulation. In the present study, the authors examined the developmental course of changes in the latency to and duration of target-waiting behaviors by following 65 boys and 55 girls from rural and semirural economically strained homes from ages 18 months to 48 months. Age-related changes in latency to and duration of children's anger expressions and attention focus (e.g., self-initiated distraction) during an 8-min wait for a gift were found. On average, at 18 and 24 months of age, children were quick to react angrily and slower to shift attention away from the desired object than they were at later ages. Over time, children were quicker to distract themselves. By 36 months, distractions occurred before children expressed anger, and anger expressions were briefer. At 48 months, children typically made a quick bid to their mothers about having to wait before distracting themselves; on average, they did not appear angry until the latter half of the wait. Unexpectedly, children bid to their mothers as much at age 48 months as they had at 18 months; however, bids became less angry as children got older. Developmental changes in distraction and bidding predicted age-related changes in the latency to anger. Findings are discussed in terms of the neurocognitive control of attention around age 30 months, the limitations of children's self-regulatory efforts at age 48 months, and the importance of fostering children's ability to forestall, as well as modulate, anger.