Developmental systems and psychopathology

“Theoretically, these effects reflect the processes (transactions; coactions) by which interactions influence development in complex living systems (Ford & Lerner, 1992; Gottlieb, 1998, 2007; Sameroff, 2000; Thelen & Smith, 1998; Ward, 1995).”

“Roeser, Eccles, and Sameroff (2000) extend the linkage between developmental studies and education even further when arguing, with respect to understanding middle school effects, for research ‘‘linking the study of adolescents’ experience, motivation, and behavior in school with the study of their…”

“When they had the same effects across levels of risk (a main effect in statistical models), they were conceptualized as assets, resources, or compensatory factors (later termed “promotive factors” by Sameroff, 2000).”

“Developmental theorists have emphasized multilevel dynamics for some time (Cicchetti, 1990; Ford & Lerner, 1992; Gottesman, 1974; Gottlieb, 1998; Sameroff, 2000; Sroufe, 1979, 1997; Thelen & Smith, 1998; Waddington, 1957; Weiss, 1959).”

“Whereas traditional viewpoints conceptualize maladaptation and disorder as inherent to the individual, the developmental psychopathology framework places them in the dynamic relation between the individual and the internal and external contexts (Sameroff, 2001).”

“In dynamic systems theory, more generally, changes in one area of functioning can trigger a sequence of consequences that ultimately have large developmental effects (Sameroff, 2000; Thelen, 1989).”

“Researchers acknowledge that exposure to domestic violence is a nonspecific risk factor for developmental harm, typifying the process of multifinality of development (Sameroff, 2000).”

“…longitudinal precursors that predict an increased likelihood of problems (risk factors), those that mediate or moderate exposure to risk (protective factors) (Hawkins, Catalano, & Miller, 1992), or directly have an impact on decreasing the likelihood of problems (promotive factors, Sameroff, 2000).”

“A transactional model of in fl uence captures this dynamic pattern and highlights the importance of examining reciprocal patterns of interaction that shape development over time (Sameroff, 2000 ) .”

“Resilience investigators often draw a distinction between promotive factors associated with generally better outcomes at any level of risk on the designated criteria of adaptive success and protective factors that play a special role in the context of high adversity or risk [15,30,31].”

“Developmental psychopathology models emphasize the cumulative role of multiple stressors and their timing in shaping child outcome (Rutter, 2000; Sameroff, 2000).”

“While resilience is what “protective” factors and processes engender—by preventing an individual from succumbing to or being harmed by some contextual adversity (Rutter, 1987), vantage sensitivity refers to “promotive” influences (Sameroff, 2000) and is about an individual benefiting—more than others—from a positive e…”

“First, such transitions appear to reflect change in opportunities as multiple systems that sustain continuity in the organism and its transactions with the environment enter a period of flux, where reorganization may become easier~Ford & Lerner, 1992; Sameroff, 2000; Thelen & Smith, 1998!.”

“A transactional model of influence captures this dynamic pattern and highlights the importance of examining reciprocal patterns of interaction that shape development over time ( Sameroff, 2000 ).”

“We present our perspective through the lens of relationship developmental systems theory (Sameroff 2000, Lerner et al. 2012, Overton 2013), which integrates principles from developmental systems theory (Lerner, 2006), ecological systems theory (Bronfenbrenner and Morris 2006), family systems theory…”

“…initially and broadly as “protective factors,” these explanatory concepts would later be differentiated into two broad categories: promotive factors (Sameroff, 2000; also known as assets or resources, human or social capital) that were helpful both in low and high adversity conditions, and…”

“…be cocreated for individual dyads when infants have difficult temperaments compared with easy temperaments, when parents have inadequate social support or must cope with multiple stressors (Greenspan, 2008; Sameroff, 2000), or when parents live in different cultural contexts (LeVine et al., 2008).”

“In light of the variable nature of the inter- cumulation of risk factors, which can be quite varied in their nature (Rutter, 2000; Rutter &action of early attachment and contextual risk in predicting later development, a primary Sroufe, 2000; Sameroff, 2000).”

“Secondly, for many developmental outcomes, it is the quantity rather than quality of risk factors that is most predictive (Sameroff, 2000).”

“Bioecological and transactional theories view child development as a product of a reciprocal exchange between children and the multiple ecologies in which children's lives are embedded (Bronfenbrenner, 1986; Sameroff, 2000).”

“This is particularly beneficial if it is the quantity of exposures, rather than the quality of any single exposure, that strongly predicts health outcomes, as many mental health studies have shown (Sameroff 2000).”

“Developmental systems theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1979; Cicchetti, 1990b; Ford & Lerner, 1992; Granic & Hollenstein, 2003; Lerner, 1998; Sameroff, 2000a, 2000b; Thelen & Smith, 1998) is the prevailing conceptual framework in developmental psychopathology.”

“As such, our proposal of a trandisciplinary AL model shares similarities with transactional models already espoused in the field of developmental psychopathology (Sameroff, 2000, 2009; Sameroff & Mackenzie, 2003).”

“…problems may be interrelated over time because problems in one domain of functioning spread to another domain through various pathways corresponds to a cascade model (Masten, Burt, & Coatsworth, 2006; Masten & Cicchetti, 2010; Rutter & Sroufe, 2000; Sameroff, 2000; Sameroff & Mackenzie, 2003).”

“Based on transactional (e.g., Sameroff, 2000; Sameroff & Chandler, 1975; Sameroff & MacKenzie, 2003) and developmental cascade models (Masten et al., 2005) and drawing from interpersonal theories of depression (e.g., Joiner, Coyne, & Blalock, 1999), this multiwave study examined the overarching…”

“Our conceptualization of school order and safety not only encompasses a wide range of behavioral phenomena, ranging from disruptive behavior in the classroom to playground bullying, to teacher assaults and rampage shootings, but also covers systemic issues that traverse ecologies of the student and transactional devel…”

“Failure to acquire such competences is hypothesized to influence the development of internalizing and externalizing problems (Masten, 2006; Patterson & Capaldi, 1990; Sameroff, 2000), for example, by constraining the options for dealing with day-to-day challenges and increasing the individual’s vulnerability to stress.”

“…disorders/ syndromes Psychopathology as deviation from typicality At the core of developmental psychopathology is a conceptualization of disorders as deviations from typicality in degree and kind (Garber, 1984; Offer & Sabshin, 1974; Rutter & Sroufe 2000; Sameroff, 2000; Sroufe & Rutter, 1984).”

“Ecological systems (Bronfenbrenner, 1979), dynamic systems (Tseng & Seidman, 2007), and developmental systems (Sameroff, 2000) perspectives guide our overall focus on teachers, classrooms, and children.”

“Factors with positive effects independent of risk have been variously termed promotive factors (Sameroff, 2000), assets, or resources.”

“For example, Sameroff found that the more risk factors in the environment, the greater the prevalence of clinical symptoms in preschoolers, as well as at 13 and 18 years of age (Sameroff et al. 1987, 1998; Sameroff, 2000).”

“Thus, developmental psychologists suggest that antisocial behavior patterns are products of the dynamic relation between individuals and their environmental contexts ( Sameroff, 2000 ).”

“Although it is generally accepted that development is a function of both personal and contextual factors (Sameroff, 2000), most research predicting outcomes for adults with ASD has focused only on personal characteristics.”

“The results of this study fit ecological models that conceptualize the development of the individual as the product of the interplay between biological and social processes (Hill, 2002; Sameroff, 2000).”

“From an ecological or contextual perspective, the child is nested in a complex network of interconnected systems (cf. Belsky, 1984; Bronfenbrenner, 1986; Dishion, French, & Patterson, 1995; Sameroff, 2000), and therefore multiple sources may contribute to the development of (problem) behavior in children.”

“This is particularly clear when positive adaptation is viewed as a function of strong person–context interactions (Larson 2000), that can shift over time according to changes in the individual, the context, and their interaction (Cicchetti and Rogosch 2002; Sameroff 2000; Schulenberg et al. 2004).”

“Behavioral development is here conceived as an epigenetic, stochastic process that is historically constructed through system-wide activity (for a discussion of the early contributions of Kuo, 1967, and Schneirla, 1957, in a historyof these ideas, see Gottlieb, 1976; Thelen & Smith, 2006).”

“…from family systems theories with a focus on the interdependent nature of family relationships (Cox & Paley, 2003) and the transactional framework (Sameroff, 2000) where the bidirectional influence of risk and protective factors are examined over time in an effort to explain the development of…”

“Within systems theory, changes in one area of function may amplify to trigger a cascade of reverberations with broad developmental implications in the long term (Masten et al., 2005; Sameroff, 2000; Thelen, 1989).”

“Moreover, research suggests that parent–child interactions are bidirectional and as such may have cascading effects that serve to further entrain aberrant reward and punishment processing (Dodge and Pettit 2003; Pardini et al. 2008; Sameroff 2000).”

“According to the developmental psychopathology (DP) perspective, early experiences of adversity shape pathways to future adaptation and maladaptation by undermining positive expectations about safety and social relationships and disrupting the foundation for adaptive emotional and behavioral regulation (Cicchetti & To…”

“Indeed, Sameroff (2000) concluded, “My own view is that the appropriatefrom complex developmental theory to rigorous experimental design to comprehensive model for understanding developmental psychopathology is one that matches the com-statistical analysis and back to developmental theory.”

“with developmental contextualism and the ecological approach, a developmental psychopathology perspective (Cicchetti and Garmezy 1993; Cicchetti and Rogosch 2002) purports that the development of psychological problems depends on the dynamic interaction between the individual and the individual’s contexts (Sameroff, 2…”

“This viewpoint of development as a bi-directional dynamic process with risk factors considered as probabilistic rather than deterministic is held broadly by developmental psychologists (see Cicchetti and Rogosch 1996; Rutter and Sroufe 2000; Sameroff 2000, for a review).”

“Finally, the developmental psychopathology perspective promotes the viewpoint that children are the product of continuous interactions between the child and the child’s environment (Cicchetti, 1984; Sameroff, 2000).”

“, child physical and/or sexual abuse, psychological abuse, exposure to domestic violence) is best understood as a nonspecific risk factor embedded within a complex developmental course (Sameroff, 2000).”

“The second model suggests that risk factors impact developmental outcomes in a linear or additive fashion, whereby the greater the number of risks, the greater the prevalence and severity of maladjustment (Sameroff, 2000; Sameroff, Siefer, & Bartko, 1997).”

“Psychosocial risk factors that have been associated with youth psychiatric disorders in previous studies (e.g., Sameroff, 2000) were also collected in the CAPA.”

“Influential frameworks include Sameroff’s transactional theory of the impacts of parental psychopathology (Sameroff, 2000), Cicchetti’s ecological/transactional model of the impacts of child maltreatment (Cicchetti & Lynch, 1993), and Rutter’s pathways theory which identifies lifetime direct and…”

“Sameroff (2000) has asserted that examining only the influence of parents on children ignores the dynamic, transactional nature of family relationships, and that children may influence the environment (i.e., parents) as much as they are influenced by it.”

“Transactional-ecological theories propose that environmental influences from birth interact with genetic predisposition to cause patterns of behavior that are reinforced in subsequent interactions (Sameroff, 2000).”

“An alternative position ( Sameroff, 1975, 2000 ) is that family members interact with and influence the environment that in turn affects them (e.g., Rueter & Conger, 1998).”

“These influences include favoring or blocking reciprocal adaptation, protecting from possible risk factors or, on the contrary, transmitting negative influences [20,21,25–27].”