child temperament and parental personality - helda -
TRANSCRIPT
Child temperament and parental personality:
continuity and transactional change
Niina Komsi
Department of Psychology University of Helsinki, Finland
Academic dissertation to be publicly discussed, by due permission of the Faculty of Behavioral Sciences
at the University of Helsinki in Auditorium XIII, Unioninkatu 34, on the 5th
of June, 2009, at 12 o’clock
UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI Department of Psychology
Studies 60: 2009
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Supervisor: Professor Katri Räikkönen-Talvitie Department of Psychology, University of Helsinki, Finland Reviewers: Professor Sam Putnam Psychology Department, Bowdoin College, USA Professor Maria A. Gartstein Department of Psychology, Washington State University, USA Opponent: Professor Franz J. Neyer Institut für Psychologie, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, Germany
ISSN 0781-8254 ISBN 978-952-10-5593-5 (pbk.) ISBN 978-952-10-5594-2 (PDF)
http://www.ethesis.helsinki.fi Helsinki University Printing House
Helsinki 2009
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CONTENTS ABSTRACT 5 TIIVISTELMÄ 7 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 9 LIST OF ORIGINAL PUBLICATIONS 10 1 INTRODUCTION 11 1.1 Temperament dimensions and personality traits: theoretically, temporally and practically related constructs 11 1.2 Temperament in childhood within the developmental framework of Mary
K. Rothbart 12
1.2.1 Continuity of temperament from infancy onwards 13 1.2.2 Mothers and fathers as informants of the child’s temperament 16 1.3 Personality traits in adulthood 18 1.3.1 Stability and change in personality traits 18 1.3.2 Personality traits of extraversion and neuroticism during
adulthood 20
1.4 Transactional development of parental personality and child temperament
21
1.4.1 Implications of child temperament for parental extraversion and neuroticism
24
1.4.2 Implications of parental extraversion and neuroticism for child temperament
25
1.4.3 Child temperament and parental situational factors: the case of parental stress
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1.4.3.1 Implications of child temperament for parental stress 28 1.4.3.2 Implications of parental stress for child temperament 30 1.5 Aims of the study 31 1.5.1 Continuity of temperament from infancy to middle childhood 32 1.5.1.1 Study I. Continuity of mother-rated temperament 32 1.5.1.2 Study II. Continuity of father-rated temperament 34 1.5.2 Transactional development of parent and child characteristics
from infancy to middle childhood 34
1.5.2.1 Study III. Parental personality traits of extraversion and neuroticism and infant/child temperament
34
1.5.2.2 Study IV. Mother’s overall stress and infant/child temperament
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2 METHODS 37 2.1 Outline of the study 37 2.2 Participants 37 2.3 Measures 38 2.3.1 Infant temperament 38 2.3.2 Child temperament 40 2.3.3 Parental personality traits 41 2.3.4 Perceived stress 41 2.4 Statistical analyses 42
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3 RESULTS 44 3.1 Study I. Continuity of mother-rated temperament from infancy to middle
childhood 44
3.1.1 Continuity of temperament subscales and superconstructs 44 3.1.2 Person-level continuity of temperament: “temperament types” 47 3.2 Study II. Continuity of father-rated temperament and congruence
between mother- and father-rated continuity 49
3.2.1 Continuity of father-rated temperament subscales and superconstructs
49
3.2.2 Congruence between mother- and father-rated continuity of temperament
52
3.3 Study III. Transaction between parental personality traits and child temperament
54
3.4 Study IV. Transaction between maternal stress and child temperament 57 3.4.1 Transaction between maternal stress and individual
temperament subscales 57
3.4.2 Transaction between maternal stress and latent temperament superconstructs
58
4 DISCUSSION 59 4.1 Continuity of parent-rated temperament from infancy to middle
childhood 59
4.2 Developmental transaction between parent and child characteristics 65 4.2.1 Transactional development of parental personality traits and
child temperament 65
4.2.2 Transactional development of maternal stress and child temperament
71
4.3 General conclusions 73 4.4 Weaknesses and strengths of the study 74 4.5 Theoretical and clinical implications 76 REFERENCES 81
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Abstract Studying the continuity and underlying mechanisms of temperament change from early
childhood through adulthood is clinically and theoretically relevant. Knowledge of the
continuity and change of temperament from infancy onwards, especially as perceived by
both parents is, however, still scanty. Only in recent years have researchers become
aware that personality, long considered as stable in adulthood, may also change.
Further, studies that focus on the transactional change of child temperament and
parental personality also seem to be lacking, as are studies focusing on transactions
between child temperament and more transient parental characteristics, like parental
stress. Therefore, this longitudinal study examined the degree of continuity of
temperament over five years from the infant’s age of six months to the child’s age of
five and a half years, as perceived by both biological parents, and also investigated the
bidirectional effects between child temperament and parents’ personality traits and
overall stress experienced during that time.
First, moderate to high levels of continuity of temperament from infancy to middle
childhood were shown, depicting the developmental links between affectively positive
and well-adjusted temperament characteristics, and between characteristics of early and
later negative affectivity. The continuity of temperament was quantitatively and
qualitatively similar in both parents’ ratings. The findings also demonstrate that infant
and childhood temperament characteristics cluster to form temperament types that
resemble personality types shown in child and adult personality studies.
Second, the parental personality traits of extraversion and neuroticism were shown
to be highly stable over five years, but evidence of change in relation to parents’ views
of their child’s temperament was also shown: an infant’s higher positive affectivity
predicted an increase in parental extraversion, while the infant’s higher activity level
predicted a decrease in parental neuroticism over five years. Furthermore, initially
higher parental extraversion predicted higher ratings of the child’s effortful control,
while initially higher parental neuroticism predicted the child’s higher negative
affectivity. In terms of changes in parental stress, the infant’s higher activity level
predicted a decrease in maternal overall stress, while initially higher maternal stress
predicted a higher level of child negative affectivity in middle childhood.
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Together, the results demonstrate that the mother- and father-rated temperament of
the child shows continuity during the early years of life, but also support the view that
the development of temperament is sensitive to important contextual factors such as
parental personality and overall stress. While parental personality and experienced
stress were shown to have an effect on the child’s developing temperament, the reverse
was also true: the parents’ own personality traits and perceived stress seemed to be
highly stable, but also susceptible to their experiences of their child’s temperament.
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Tiivistelmä Temperamentin ja persoonallisuuden pysyvyyden, sekä niiden muuttumiseen
vaikuttavien mekanismien selvittäminen varhaisvuosien ja aikuisuuden aikana on sekä
teoreettisesti että kliinisesti merkityksellistä. Tieto temperamentin pysyvyydestä ja
muuttumisesta vauvaiästä eteenpäin, erityisesti molempien vanhempien arvioimana on
kuitenkin yhä vähäistä. Vasta viime vuosina tutkijat ovat tulleet tietoisiksi siitä, että
myös aikuisiässä pysyvänä pidetty persoonallisuus saattaa muuttua. Vielä ei kuitenkaan
ole tutkittu sitä miten lapsen temperamentti ja vanhemman persoonallisuus vaikuttavat
toisiinsa ajan myötä. Vanhemman tilannekohtaisempien ominaisuuksien, kuten stressin
määrän, ja lapsen temperamentin vastavuoroisia vaikutuksia ei myöskään ole vielä
riittävästi tutkittu. Tässä pitkittäistutkimuksessa tarkasteltiin lapsen temperamentin
pysyvyyttä kuuden kuukauden iästä viiden ja puolen vuoden ikään, lapsen molempien
biologisten vanhempien arvioimana. Lisäksi tarkasteltiin kaksisuuntaista vaikutusta
lapsen temperamentin ja vanhemman persoonallisuuden ja stressitason välillä näiden
viiden vuoden aikana.
Tulokset osoittivat lapsen temperamenttiominaisuuksilla olevan kohtalainen tai
vahva pysyvyys vauvaiästä viiden ja puolen vuoden ikään. Kehityksellisiä yhteyksiä
löydettiin sekä myönteiseen affektiivisuuteen ja sopeutuvuuteen liittyvien
ominaisuuksien välillä, että negatiiviseen affektiivisuuteen liittyvien ominaisuuksien
välillä. Temperamentin pysyvyys näyttäytyi samanlaisena molempien vanhempien
arvioissa. Tutkimus osoitti myös miten temperamenttipiirteet vauvaiästä lähtien
yhdistyvät persoonallisuustutkimuksessa vakiintuneita lasten ja aikuisten
persoonallisuustyyppejä vastaaviksi temperamenttityypeiksi.
Vanhempien ekstraversio- ja neurotisismi –persoonallisuuspiirteet olivat varsin
pysyviä viiden vuoden aikana, mutta tutkimus osoitti myös piirteiden muuttumisen
suhteessa vanhemman näkemykseen lapsen temperamentista: vauvan korkeammalle
arvioitu positiivinen affektiivisuus ennusti vanhemman korkeampaa ekstraversiota, ja
vauvan korkeampi aktiivisuustaso ennusti vanhemman alempaa neurotisismin tasoa
viiden vuoden jälkeen. Samaan aikaan, vanhemman alun perin korkeampi ekstraversion
taso ennusti lapsen temperamentin korkeampaa tahdonalaista itsesäätelyä, kun taas alun
alkaen korkeampi vanhemman neurotisismi ennusti lapsen korkeampaa negatiivista
affektiivisuutta viiden vuoden jälkeen. Vanhemman näkemys vauvasta aktiivisempana
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ennusti myös äidin vähäisempää stressiä viiden vuoden jälkeen, ja äidin alun alkaen
korkeampi stressitaso ennusti lapsen kasvavaa negatiivista affektiivisuutta viiden
vuoden jälkeen.
Kokonaisuudessaan tutkimus osoittaa lapsen temperamentin pysyvyyden
ensimmäisten viiden vuoden aikana, sekä äidin että isän arvioimana, mutta tukee myös
käsitystä temperamentin kehityksen alttiudesta tärkeille ympäristötekijöille, kuten
vanhempien persoonallisuuspiirteille ja vanhemman stressin määrälle. Samalla kun
vanhemman persoonallisuus ja koetun stressin määrä vaikuttivat lapsen temperamentin
kehitykseen, nämä vanhemman sinänsä varsin pysyviksi osoittautuneet ominaisuudet
olivat myös alttiita lapsen temperamenttiominaisuuksien vaikutukselle.
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Acknowledgements I would like to thank several people who have contributed to and supported me in this
endeavour.
My deepest gratitude I owe to my supervisor Professor Katri Räikkönen-Talvitie for
offering me the opportunity to undertake this task. Without her research expertise,
dedication and clarity of thought, along with her exceptional ability to solve the most
insoluble problems, this work would not have been possible.
I wish to thank the reviewers of this thesis, Professor Maria A. Gartstein and
Professor Sam Putnam, for their valuable comments that helped me improve this work.
I also thank my co-authors, Docent Anna-Liisa Järvenpää and Professor Timo E.
Strandberg, for their supportive collaboration in the Glaku- project.
I am deeply indebted to the whole Developmental Psychology research group, and
especially Docent Kati Heinonen-Tuomaala and Docent Anu-Katriina Pesonen, for their
unforgettable helpfulness and never-ending support. Sharing the joys and difficulties of
this work with them has been a privilege. I am also deeply grateful to Researcher Pertti
Keskivaara for his enthusiasm for solving statistical problems with me.
This work was carried out in the Department of Psychology at the University of
Helsinki, and was made financially possible by the Finnish Graduate School of
Psyhcology, the Academy of Finland, the University of Helsinki and the Signe and Ane
Gyllenberg, Jahnsson and Juho Vainio foundations, which I gratefully acknowledge.
I offer my heartfelt thanks to my mother Irja and my father Mauri, who have always
been there for me and have had faith in me in all my endeavours. And finally, I need to
express my love and gratitude to my husband Oki, who has been the best companion I
could ever dream of. He is also the most caring and trustworthy father to our children
Joel and Annina. Whatever I do, they are my greatest source of happiness and
inspiration, and to them I dedicate this work.
Helsinki, May 2009 Niina Komsi
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LIST OF ORIGINAL PUBLICATIONS
I Komsi, N, Räikkönen, K., Pesonen, A-K., Heinonen, K., Keskivaara, P.,
Järvenpää, A-L., & Strandberg, T.E. (2006). Continuity of temperament from
infancy to middle childhood. Infant Behavior & Development, 29, 494-508.
II Komsi, N., Räikkönen, K., Heinonen, K., Pesonen, A-K., Keskivaara, P.,
Järvenpää, A-L., & Strandberg, T.E. (2008). Continuity of father-rated
temperament from infancy to middle childhood. Infant Behavior & Development,
31, 239-254.
III Komsi, N., Räikkönen, K., Heinonen, K., Pesonen, A-K., Keskivaara, P.,
Järvenpää, A-L., & Strandberg, T.E. (2008). Transactional development of parent
personality and child temperament. European Journal of Personality, 22, 553–
573.
IV Pesonen, A-K., Räikkönen, K., Heinonen, K., Komsi, N., Järvenpää, A-L., &
Strandberg, T.E. (2008). A transactional model of temperamental development:
evidence of a relationship between child temperament and maternal stress over
five years. Social Development, 17, 326-340.
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1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Temperament dimensions and personality traits:
theoretically, temporally and practically related constructs The main assumption in personality trait theory is that traits represent partly heritable,
temperament -based individual predispositions, which show consistency across time and
situations (McCrae et al., 2000). In other words, the structure of adult personality is
presumed to emerge from early temperament that serves as a substrate for personality
development (Costa & McCrae, 2000). In recent literature, the phenomena described by
temperament and personality constructs have been concluded to be more alike than
different (Caspi, Roberts, & Shiner, 2005; Mervielde, De Clercq, De Fruyt, & Van
Leeuwen, 2005), and even in the temperament dimensions emerging from infancy
research, similarities with the higher order factor structures extracted from adult studies
of personality can be seen (Rothbart & Ahadi, 1994; Rothbart, Ahadi, & Evans, 2000a).
Therefore, it is not surprising that research on temperament and personality has
increasingly concentrated on questions of development.
Temperament in childhood has generally been described as the constellation of
inborn traits that determines a child’s unique behavioral style and the way he or she
experiences and reacts to the world (Goldsmith et al., 1987; Rothbart & Bates, 2006).
There is general agreement between different temperament theorists on the biologically-
based individual differences that show modest to moderate degrees of continuity during
infancy and from early childhood onwards (Lemery, Goldsmith, Klinnert, & Mrazek,
1999; Goldsmith et al., 1987; Rothbart & Bates, 2006): temperament is thus thought to
describe those aspects of behavioral response that are not due to interactions with
caregivers or other environmental influences, but rather those aspects that are present
from birth and biologically based. Further, although temperament is traditionally
viewed as consisting of these biologically-based behavioral traits, its manifestation in
behavioral patterns is of interest: it is such patterns that influence children’s interactions
in the world, and to which parents, teachers, and peers respond (Calkins, Blandon,
Williford, & Keane, 2007).
In developmental research, the study of the underlying mechanisms that account for
stability and/or change in temperament and personality from the early years onwards
and during adulthood bears great theoretical as well as clinical relevance. From a
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theoretical point of view, research on temporal stability and change and its correlates
can shed light on the relative influence of maturational and environmental factors on
temperament and personality development. In order to be able to examine the dynamics
and correlates of developmental stability and change, the researchers are, however, first
challenged to detect and establish the degree of continuity and developmental courses of
the manifestations of temperament and personality from the very early stages onwards
(Caspi & Roberts, 1999; Goldsmith, 1996; Rothbart, 1989; Rothbart & Bates, 2006).
From a practical or clinical point of view, a better understanding of temporal stability
and change in temperament and personality characteristics can inform therapeutic
approaches to personality-related psychological problems and help to develop
interventions tailored to the needs of individual clients (Widiger, Costa, & McCrae,
2002). Given the importance of such questions, it is no wonder that recent years have
seen a surge in meta-analyses examining longitudinal stability and change in personality
traits during adulthood (see Ardelt, 2000; Roberts & DelVecchio, 2000; Roberts,
Walton, & Viechtbauer, 2006), along with increasing evidence of temperament- and
personality-related antecedents and correlates of health and adjustment at all age stages
(Nigg, 2006; Hampson, 2008; Roberts, Kuncel, Shiner, Caspi, & Goldberg, 2007;
Shipley, Weiss, Der, Taylor, & Deary, 2007). However, generalizations from previous
studies on personality development are still limited. Our knowledge of the development
of early temperament in itself is also still scanty, as is our knowledge of individual
differences in change and its predictors in adult personality.
1.2 Temperament in childhood within the developmental
framework of Mary K. Rothbart According to Mary K. Rothbart and her colleagues, temperament refers to
constitutionally-based individual differences in reactivity and self-regulation (Rothbart
& Bates, 2006). Constitutional in this sense (Rothbart & Derryberry, 1981) refers to the
biological basis of temperament, which becomes influenced over time by heredity,
maturation, and experience. The general factor of reactivity is seen as being directly
related to the responsivity of the nervous system to sensory stimulation, referring to the
excitability, responsivity or arousability of the physiological and behavioral systems.
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Self-regulation, in turn, refers to the neural and behavioral processes functioning to
modulate this reactivity (Rothbart & Derryberry, 1981).
In Rothbart’s conceptualization, temperament in infancy refers to early differences in
motor activity, smile-proneness, soothability, attention span, anger-proneness and
fearful distress, operationalized either in a laboratory observation (Goldsmith &
Rothbart, 1991, 1996), or in parent reports (Rothbart, 1981). The subscales further form
two latent superconstructs, labeled positive and negative affectivity. Not all of these
infant temperament characteristics are present at birth (smile, fear), or are not
sufficiently matured to function as valid predictors of later temperamental development.
Therefore, temperamental continuity measured either through distinct behavioral
characteristics or through positive/negative affectivity superconstructs, is assumed to
become apparent only after the early months of infancy.
In childhood, the central concepts of temperament, such as reactivity, arousability,
and self regulation remain, but it is the individual differences in the ability to utilize
inhibitory and attentional mechanisms in the service of regulation that begin to
characterize childhood temperament (Rothbart & Derryberry, 1981). By the third year
of life, initial reactivity as the dominant developmental theme is replaced by behavior
regulation (Rothbart, Derryberry, & Posner, 1994). That is, as the child develops, initial
reactivity and early efforts to regulate the reactivity will be supplemented by an
increasing capacity for voluntary forms of control (Rothbart & Bates, 2006).
Childhood temperament can be depicted by the individual domains of activity level,
anger-proneness, positive anticipation, attentional focusing, discomfort related to
sensory qualities of stimulation, soothability, fear, the amount of pleasure related to
high or low stimulus intensity, impulsivity, inhibitory control, low intensity pleasure,
perceptual sensitivity, sadness, shyness, and the amount of smiling and laughter
(Rothbart, Ahadi, Hershey, & Fisher, 2001). These domains can be further combined
into the distinct superconstructs of extraversion, effortful control and negative
affectivity (Rothbart et al., 2001).
1.2.1 Continuity of temperament from infancy onwards
The continuity of temperamental characteristics over time and in different contexts is,
by definition, among the hallmarks of Rothbart’s theory, and the early appearing
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temperamental differences are assumed to provide a foundation for later emotional and
personality development (Derryberry & Rothbart, 1997). Within this framework, the
developmental discontinuity or lawful change (Caspi & Roberts, 1999; Kagan, 1971;
Rothbart & Bates, 2006) in early temperament can also be theoretically defined and
understood. As a developing entity with increasing and differentiating manifestations
from infancy onwards (Rothbart & Bates, 2006), temperament can thus be defined in
terms of both homotypic and heterotypic continuity over time. Further, also dynamic
relations between genetically unrelated traits are acknowledged, i.e. the development of
one trait can implicate changes in the development of another, genetically unrelated trait
(Putnam et al., 2008).
By the concept homotypic continuity, the literal continuity, or stability over time of a
temperament characteristic is indicated, whereas heterotypic continuity refers to the
continuity between phenotypically different, but genotypically related attributes of
temperament (see Caspi & Roberts, 1999). To be interpreted as heterotypic continuity,
or coherence, as it has also been called, temperamental continuity has to be theoretically
defined a priori: the models of continuity require theoretically derived predictions
relating certain types of infant temperament to specific behaviors in childhood; these
predictions ought to be based upon theories of development that allow one to predict
age-appropriate changes in the phenotypic expression of a common genotype (Caspi &
Roberts, 1999). For example, one might predict that the same pattern of fear responses
to novelty observed in infancy would be found in later childhood, depicting homotypic
continuity, while heterotypic continuity would refer to relations between earlier and
later fearful behavior that are based upon age-appropriate and logical associations rather
than similarities in exact behaviors. That is, although infant negative affectivity can be
composed of fear and anger, the manifestations of negative affectivity in later childhood
are proposed to encompass more behavioral characteristics, such as proneness to
discomfort and expressions of sadness.
As the measures for infant and childhood temperament conceptualize temperament
similarly, but differ in the number of dimensions, the structural continuity of
temperament in this work is also not explored as defined by Caspi, i.e., the persistence
of correlational patterns among a set of variables across time (Caspi & Roberts, 1999),
but will rather describe associations across time between temperament constructs that
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are based on individual dimensions of temperament in infancy and on individual
dimensions of temperament in childhood.
Furthermore, these descriptions of variable-level continuity of temperament do not,
however, mirror continuity at the person (within-subject) level. While the research
focusing on temperament-variables assesses their interpersonal correlational structure,
utilizing the above-mentioned concepts, the person-centered approach examines typical
within-person configurations (Asendorpf & van Aken, 1999; Bergman & Magnusson,
2001; see also Robins & Tracy, 2003), and suggests yet another type of continuity, i.e.,
ipsative continuity (Caspi & Roberts, 1999). Essentially, ipsative continuity is
equivalent to structural continuity except it is considered at the level of the individual
rather than a group or population. The person-centered approach thus depicts the
development of temperament by individual temperament types or profiles, where each
temperament dimension derives its meaning from its relations to the other dimensions
within the individual.
All in all, given the fact that Rothbart’s theory is among the most prominent current
theories of temperament, and that research activity emphasizing this particular approach
is intensifying, studies focusing on the continuity of temperament within Rothbart’s
psychobiological framework are still surprisingly scarce. Rothbart’s conceptual and
operational definitions have been used in studying continuity of temperament within
developmental phases, i.e., during infancy (Carnicero, Pérez-López, Salinas, &
Martinéz-Fuentes, 2000; Denham, Lehman, Moser, & Reeves, 1995; Gartstein et al.,
2006; Lemery et al., 1999; Rothbart, 1981, 1986; Stifter, Willoughby, & Towe-
Goodman, 2008), toddlerhood (Putnam, Gartstein, & Rothbart, 2006) and childhood
(Kochanska & Knaack, 2003; Majdandzic & van den Boom, 2008; Rothbart et al.,
2001), but to my knowledge, only three studies have extended the scope across different
developmental phases from infancy to childhood (Aksan et al., 1999; Putnam, Rothbart,
& Gartstein, 2008; Rothbart, Derryberry, & Hershey, 2000b).
In the study by Rothbart and her colleagues (2000b), theoretically relevant continuity
of temperament from infancy to the child’s age of seven was shown in a sample of 26
children; however, due to the small sample size, the researchers highlighted the tentative
nature of the results (Rothbart et al., 2000b). Recently, Putnam and his colleagues
(2008) reported significant homotypic and heterotypic continuity for mother-rated
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characteristics of positive and negative affectivity from infancy to toddler and preschool
age.
Further, following the ipsative, person-level approach, temperament types in
childhood have previously been identified by Aksan and his colleagues (1999). They
placed 15% of 488 children in “expressive-noncontrolled” and “nonexpressive-
controlled” categories based on maternal ratings of the 31/2 and 41/2 year-old child’s
temperament, and considered whether these childhood types were different with respect
to infant temperament: relative to the “controlled-nonexpressive” children, the
“noncontrolled-expressive” children were found to have exhibited higher levels of
activity, distress to limitations, and fear in their infancy. However, the study did not
identify whether temperament characteristics in infancy and in middle childhood
together clustered to form profiles indicative of different temperament types (Aksan et
al., 1999).
Moreover, studies also exist where infant temperament has been used as a predictor
of temperament measured in toddlerhood, by using a measure that closely resembles
Rothbart’s conceptual definition (Kochanska, Murray, & Harlan, 2000; Lemery et al.,
1999). Clearly, more longitudinal research is needed to explore the developmental paths
of early temperament across different developmental phases within Rothbart’s
theoretical framework, utilizing the conceptual and operational definitions and measures
developed within this framework.
1.2.2 Mothers and fathers as informants of the child’s temperament
In temperament research, the question of objectivity in measuring child behavior
according to parental reports is open to debate (Kagan, 1994, 1998; Seifer, Sameroff,
Dickstein, Schiller, & Hayden, 2004; Stifter et al., 2008). However, parent-rated
temperament of the child has frequently shown higher age-to-age stability than
observer-rated temperament (Pauli-Pott, Mertesacker, Bade, Haverkock, & Beckmann,
2003; Rothbart et al., 2000b). Besides this greater predictive validity, recent evidence
also points to greater situational consistency of parent-ratings in comparison to more
objective perceptions (Majdandzic & van den Boom, 2007). From the developmental
point of view, it is important to further note that, within a family, especially the
17
perceptions or views that parents have of their child’s characteristics are considered
essential components of development (Belsky, 1984).
Despite the encouragement to use parent-reports, the majority of the research on
temperamental continuity to date in Rothbart’s, as in other frameworks, still relies on
maternal ratings of the child’s temperament (e.g., Aksan et al., 1999; Putnam et al.,
2008; Rothbart et al., 2000b; for another framework, see also Pedlow, Sanson, Prior, &
Oberklaid, 1993), or on combinations of mother-rated and observed temperament
(Crockenberg & Leerkes, 2006; for other frameworks, see Belsky, Fish, & Isabella,
1991; Fox, Henderson, Rubin, Calkins, & Schmidt, 2001; Stifter et al., 2008). The role
of fathers in the family dynamic is, however, already widely acknowledged, and
research on the quality of the early father–child dyad and its relation to the behavioral
characteristics and developmental outcomes of the child at all ages from infancy to early
adulthood is becoming more widespread (e.g., Amato, 1994; Amato & Gilbreth, 1999;
Belsky, Woodworth, Crnic, 1996; Parke, 2004; Ramchandani, Stein, & Evans, 2005;
Shannon, Tamis-LeMonda, & Cabrera, 2006).
Furthermore, there is mounting evidence of the predictive association between infant
temperament and the dynamics of father–child interaction (Belsky, 1996; Kochanska,
Friesenborg, Lange, & Martel, 2004; McBride, Shoppe, & Rane, 2002; Sirignano &
Lachman, 1985). Fathers and mothers are also increasingly considered comparable
informants about their children’s behavior (DeFruyt &Vollrath, 2003). Mother- and
father-rated temperament have, according to previous cross-sectional data, been shown
to be interrelated, and show a similar structural pattern in infancy, toddlerhood and
childhood (Auerbach et al., 2008; Goldsmith & Campos, 1990; Kochanska et al., 1998;
Leve, Scaramella, & Fagot, 2001; Majdandzic & van den Boom, 2008; Putnam et al.,
2006; Rothbart, 1981; Rothbart et al., 2001; Saudino, Wertz, & Gagne, 2004).
Nevertheless, evidence of the extent to which father-rated temperament shows
continuity during development is scanty, and to our knowledge, only a handful of
studies to date have focused on this issue. In other temperament frameworks, Van
Egeren (2004) found consistency of father-rated characteristics of negative affectivity
during the first six months, and Rubin, Nelson, Hastings, and Asendorpf (1999)
reported on moderate continuity of father-rated shyness from the age of two to four
18
years. Bishop, Spence, and McDonald (2003) reported significant continuity of father-
rated behavioral inhibition from the age of three to five years.
In the framework of Rothbart, the recent study of Putnam and his colleagues (2006)
demonstrated that stability estimates for fathers ratings of temperament ranged from .26
to .73 from 18 to 36 months of age, and Rothbart and her colleagues (2001) present
stability estimates for father-ratings of temperament that ranged from .48 to .76 from
five to seven years of age, for subscales encompassing characteristics of positive and
negative affectivity and effortful control. In Majdandzic’s and van den Boom’s study
(2008), mother- and father-rated temperament showed similar stabilities over seven
months during the child’s fourth year of age. To my knowledge, no previous study has
focused on the developmental continuity of father-rated temperament over
developmental phases from infancy onwards, or on comparing the mother- and father-
rated developmental paths of early temperament.
1.3 Personality traits in adulthood 1.3.1 Stability and change in personality traits For several decades, personality research has also increasingly concentrated on
questions of development. Because the descriptions about personality remain the same
across time, the dimensions of adult personality are defined to be homotypically
continuous (homotypic referring to literal continuity or stability over time) (Caspi &
Roberts, 1999). Recent theoretical discussions have, however, focused on the relative
contributions of biological as compared to environmental factors on the homotypic
continuity, or temporal stability of personality (e.g., Ardelt, 2000; Johnson, McGue, &
Krueger, 2005; Roberts, Walton, & Viechtbauer, 2006b); in the theoretical framework
developed by McCrae and his colleagues (2000), the association between personality
traits and environment is expressed in the person’s characteristic adaptations, while no
external influence on the basic temperament-based tendencies is acknowledged. A more
differentiated perspective has also emerged, suggesting that some environment-related
change in personality traits is possible even during adulthood (e.g., Caspi & Roberts,
1999; Helson et al., 2002; Roberts & Mroczek, 2008; Scollon & Diener, 2006).
Of the different concepts depicting personality change, normative change is
interpreted as the result of intrinsic trends based on rates of species-typical brain
19
maturation and age-related changes in brain function and gene expression (e.g., McCrae
et al., 2000), or a consequence of universal patterns of life experiences and social roles
(Elder, 1994). Non-normative or rank-order change, in turn, is viewed as the result of
individual differences in genetics, injury, drug abuse, or disease processes that influence
brain chemistry on an individual level (e.g., Piedmont, 2001), or as the result of
individual life experiences such as career trajectories (Roberts, 1997) or relationship
patterns (Robins, Caspi, & Moffitt, 2002). In other words, while traits may change in
the same direction for most people (normative change in the average level on any
dimension), they may also change, in magnitude or in direction, the extent of change
owing more to individual and specific environmental determinants (non-normative
change) (Costa & McCrae, 1988; Roberts, Walton, Bogg, & Caspi 2006; see also
Tennen, Affleck, & Armeli, 2005). Similar to the variable-level homo- and heterotypic
continuity of early temperament, this differential, rank-order stability is often indexed
by cross-time correlation coefficients (stability coefficients) which, for the major
personality trait domains, have generally been shown to be substantial in magnitude
(Fraley & Roberts, 2005; Costa & McCrae, 1994). This rank-order stability also tends to
decline in magnitude as the elapsed time interval increases, and to increase
systematically with age (Caspi et al., 2005; Clark & Watson, 1999; see also Fraley &
Roberts, 2005).
With regard to demographic predictors, most researchers also agree that rank-order
stability (or test–retest stability/consistency) is considerably lower among adolescents
and young adults than among older age groups (Ardelt, 2000; Roberts & DelVecchio,
2000). However, there is some disagreement regarding the age(s) or lifestages when the
age-related increase in the magnitude of the test–retest stability coefficients peaks. Until
recently, the dominant perspective has been that once adulthood is reached, which
happens around 30 years of age, there is no subsequent change in personality (Costa &
McCrae, 1994, 1997; Terracciano, Costa, & McCrae, 2006). Other studies have reported
that stability continues to increase from early adulthood to age 50 (Roberts &
DelVecchio, 2000), while some have reported curvilinear trajectories with increases
until age 50, but declines in old age (Ardelt, 2000). The patterns of rank-order stability
for men and women have generally been found to be similar (Roberts & DelVecchio,
2000).
20
1.3.2 Personality traits of extraversion and neuroticism during adulthood
The current study focuses on the two well-known personality traits, extraversion and
neuroticism (Costa & McCrae, 1992), which are included in virtually every prominent
trait model developed during the 20th century (e.g., Clark & Watson, 1999). These two
traits also have similar meanings in most models of personality, referring to positive and
negative emotionality and their regulation. Heritability estimates of extraversion and
neuroticism based on twin studies typically fall in the .40 to .60 range, with a median
value of approximately .50 (e.g., Bouchard & Loehlin, 2001; Jang, McCrae, Angleitner,
Riemann, & Livesley, 1998).
As the understanding of these traits has increased, it has become clear that they
represent basic dimensions of temperament (Clark & Watson, 1999): two key features
of temperament are that they, first, are at least partly attributable to innate biological
factors and second, have emotional processes as core, defining features (Digman, 1994).
Accordingly, extraversion and neuroticism have strong and systematic links to
emotional experience, and are associated with the basic PA and NA emotions (e.g., Abe
& Izard, 1999; Carver, Sutton, & Scheier, 2000; Gross, Sutton, Ketelaar, 1998, Larsen
& Ketelaar, 1991). Also in the framework proposed by Gray (1982, 1987), links
between neuroticism and behavioral inhibition (BIS), and between extraversion and
behavioral activation (BAS), have been reported (Jorm et al., 1999; Smits & Boeck,
2006). Extraversion and neuroticism are also considered most predictive of momentary
affect (Yik & Rusell, 2001) and the affective quality of one’s perception of reality
(Uziel, 2006) and self-esteem (Watson, Suls, & Haig, 2002).
In the adult’s personality, the level of extraversion describes the quantity and
intensity of interpersonal interaction, activity level, need for stimulation, and capacity
for joy: a person scoring high on extraversion is considered sociable, active, talkative,
person-oriented, optimistic, fun-loving, and affectionate, whereas a low-scoring person
is reserved, sober, unexuberant, aloof, task-oriented, retiring, and quiet (McCrae &
John, 1992). Neuroticism, in turn, assesses adjustment versus emotional instability and
identifies individuals prone to psychological distress, unrealistic ideas, excessive
cravings or urges, and maladaptive coping responses: a person scoring high on this trait
worries a lot and is nervous, emotional, insecure, and feels inadequate, whereas a person
21
scoring low is calm, relaxed, unemotional, hardy, secure and self-satisfied (McCrae &
John, 1992).
The reports of rank-order stabilities of extraversion and neuroticism during
adulthood for both genders have generally been relatively high, ranging from .61 to .80
between periods from two years to several decades (e.g., Costa & McCrae, 1988;
Scollon & Diener, 2006; Vaidya, Gray, & Haig, 2002; Van Aken, Denissen, Branje,
Dubas, & Goossens, 2006). However, existing evidence shows that rank-order change
in these two temperament-based traits during adulthood also occurs, which obviously
has raised the compelling question of why these changes occur.
1.4 Transactional development of parental personality and child temperament There are many potential processes that can either support or discourage developmental
continuity in child and adult temperament- and personality-related characteristics. These
processes have been described as involving transactions between a person and the
environment. During development, these transactions may lead some individuals to
experience changes not shared with others in their cohort, the extent of change owing
more to individual and specific, rather than shared environmental determinants.
Caspi (1998) describes three transactional processes that will influence the degree of
continuity of behavior over time: reactive, evocative, and proactive transactions. Within
a family, these person-environment transactions may lead to discontinuities as well as
continuities in temperament and personality. Reactive transactions emphasize individual
characteristics that impact a person’s own experience of identical environmental
conditions. Applied to models of early temperament, temperamental traits will affect the
ways in which environmental information is processed and thereby interpreted. These
temperamentally based biases in responding to the caregiving environment may be a
powerful force in maintaining and promoting early individual differences and their
stability and/or change over time. Therefore, in order to understand the origins of
various temperamental outcomes, it is essential to pay attention to the period of infancy
and the appearance of temperamental characteristics during that time. In adulthood,
temperament-based personality characteristics that impact a person’s own experience of
22
environmental conditions may also be suggested to have an effect on the way the adult
reacts to, for example, his/her child’s temperament.
Evocative transactions, in turn, refer to the manner in which unique individual
differences evoke particular responses from the environment. Those responses further
influence the manner in which the individual will respond to the environment,
establishing a self-perpetuating cycle of interaction between the individual and the
environment. This cycle may maintain continuity, but may also be suggested to promote
change in temperament and personality. For example, infants of different temperaments
may evoke different caregiving behaviors from the same parent. Or, an infant’s
temperament may evoke distinctive responses from different parents. These differences
in child and parental behaviors could serve to either maintain or diminish the expression
of temperamental and personality differences over time. The final process, proactive
transactions, refers to the manner in which individuals move beyond the environments
into which they are born and actively select and construct environments of their own
(Caspi, 1998). Within a family, the newborn infant’s environment is largely defined by
the parents, but as the child grows, both the child and the parents may be actively
constructing their mutual environment. However, within a family context, one can also
suggest that parents may try to construct an environment that is in harmony with the
child’s characteristics, even if it is not what the parents’ own personality would lead
them to choose.
Stability and change of personality characteristics and relationship qualities can thus
be considered both prerequisites and consequences of dynamic transactions between a
person and his/her relationship experiences (Lehnart & Neyer, 2006). These dynamic
transactions between individual characteristics and relationship quality are more likely
to occur in stable social environments like the family, where the individual
characteristics of parent and child represent the specific environmental determinants that
may promote stability or rank-order change in both partners of the interaction (Belsky,
1984; Caspi & Roberts, 2001; Neyer & Asendorpf, 2001). In the family, a parent and a
child can be seen as active agents who, acting according to their individual
characteristics, co-create their emerging and enduring relationship (Collins, Maccoby,
Steinberg, Hetherington & Bornstein, 2000; Kochanska et al., 2004; Lengua & Kovacs,
2005; Rubin et al., 1999; Wachs, 2006; van den Boom & Hoeksma, 1994).
23
In the existing literature, the direct links between various behavioral, physiological,
and genetic characteristics in parent and child have been reasonably well established
(e.g., Crnic & Low, 2002; Propper & Moore, 2006). In terms of longitudinal causality,
the parent’s effects on child development seem better known than the effects that
children might have on their parents’ psychological characteristics. Also the
bidirectional associations between parent and child characteristics over time still remain
less studied. Transactional models in which individual characteristics of parent and
child have been shown to be mutually influential have, so far, mainly been reported in
relation to clinically relevant outcomes like difficult temperament, psychosocial
problems and compliance of the child, or adequacy of parental behavior (e.g., Ge et al.,
1996, Lengua 2006; Patterson & Fisher, 2002).
For instance, Rubin et al. (1999) reported that child shyness at the age of two
predicted a decrease in maternal and paternal encouragement of independence over two
years, whereas parenting behaviors towards 2-year-olds did not predict the 4-year-old
child’s shyness (Rubin et al., 1999). In line with this kind of directionality, Belsky et al.
(2000) reported that during the child’s third year, a child’s inhibited behavior was likely
to increase parental reactivity in terms of both discouraging and encouraging behaviors,
whereas parental reactions to the child’s inhibition were poor predictors of inhibited
behavior. However, the existing literature of associations between parental
psychological characteristics (e.g., Belsky et al., 1991; Kochanska et al., 2004) and
subsequent child behavior indicate towards parental effects as well, and raise the
question of possible bidirectional causality for these inhibition-related, as well as other
aspects of child temperament from infancy onwards.
Further, according to Belsky’s (1984) ecological model, the quality of parenting is
especially influenced by three main classes of factors: parent, child and situational
characteristics, like contextual stress and supports. Within a family system, parental
views of their own and the child’s characteristics, feelings and behavior can thereby be
understood as psychological resources or contextual components that will determine the
degree to which a parent and child will affect each other from the child’s early years
onwards (Belsky, 1984). These perceived characteristics may also be differentially
susceptible to each other’s influence. That is, parents’ own characteristics may lead to
changes in their views of their children’s temperament-related behavior, or it may be
24
that parents who view their children as initially higher in some but not other
temperamental characteristics may be prone to such parenting experiences that will
eventually lead to changes in their views of their own characteristics.
In this study, the environment where the rank-order stability or change in parental
and child characteristics is examined is conceptualized in terms of child temperament
and parental personality traits and, as a more situational characteristic, the amount of
overall parental stress. Even though the existing studies regarding associations between
the child’s temperament and parental personality-related characteristics are still
relatively ambiguous in regard to causal influence, an attempt of categorizing the
studies into those where child effects on the parent are indicated and those indicating
parent effects on the child may be of help in forming a general picture of the current
knowledge.
1.4.1 Implications of child temperament for parental extraversion and neuroticism So far, research on the rank-order stability of extraversion and neuroticism has already
provided some evidence of possible environmental promoters of change: recent
evidence shows that higher life- and work-related satisfaction associates with an
increase in extraversion, while lower satisfaction, stress and unemployment relate to an
increase in neuroticism (Roberts, Caspi, & Moffitt, 2003; Roberts & Chapman, 2000;
Scollon & Diener, 2006; Van Aken et al., 2006). Neyer and Asendorpf (2001), in turn,
have proposed that it is interpersonal relations, such as marital and family experiences,
that have the highest potential to affect personality change in adulthood: they found that
young adults who had recently begun dating showed greater declines in neuroticism and
shyness (a reverse facet of extraversion) and larger increases in extraversion compared
to participants whose relationship status had not changed. Similarly, getting married and
living in a more satisfying relationship has been shown to be associated with an increase
in emotional stability and a decrease in neuroticism, while marital tensions, lower
marital satisfaction and divorce associate with an increase in neuroticism (Costa,
Herbst, McCrae, & Siegler, 2000; Roberts & Chapman, 2000; Robins et al., 2002). Still,
questions regarding potential promoters of change in personality during adulthood
25
(Roberts et al., 2006b; Scollon & Diener, 2006; Terracciano, McCrae, Brant, & Costa,
2005) have so far remained largely unresolved.
Of the important stages and roles of adult life, parenting a young child can be
considered a very significant and intimate interpersonal experience that has the potential
to cause enduring effects on an individual. While the parental self-concept gradually
changes during parenthood (Cowan, Cowan, Heming, & Miller, 1991), this identity
process, involving the commitment to a new social role, is also likely to involve at least
some change in parental personality over time (Roberts, Wood, & Smith, 2005).
Therefore, through their unique impact on parental behavior and on the quality of the
parent–child relationship (Calkins, Hungerford, & Dedmon, 2004; Collins et al., 2000;
Rubin et al., 1999), temperamentally different children may, in the course of time, also
have a unique impact on parents’ own personality traits.
Evidence already exists that positively affective babies evoke more positive reactions
from their caregivers than negatively affective babies (e.g., Kochanska et al., 2004;
Scarr, 1992; Van den Boom, 1989). In terms of changes in maternal psychological well
being, Gartstein and Sheeber (2004) reported that within a group of mothers having
parenting difficulties with their 3 to 6-year-old children, child externalizing behavior
was predictive of a decline in maternal self-perceived parenting competence: this, in
turn, contributed to an increase in maternal depressive symptoms over one year. Further,
associations between the child’s early temperament and changes in parents’ sense of
global efficacy, personal control, anxiety, and dispositional optimism over time have
been shown to exist (Heinonen, Räikkönen, Scheier, Pesonen, Järvenpää, & Strandberg,
2006; Sirignano & Lachman, 1985). Parenting experiences have also been shown to be
associated with changes in maternal personality-related characteristics like ego
resiliency, feelings of dependency and fearfulness (Paris & Helson, 2002). Still, the
influence that the child may actually have on the parents’ personality traits, and
especially on the two ‘best-known’ traits extraversion and neuroticism, is less known.
1.4.2 Implications of parental extraversion and neuroticism for child temperament
As Rothbart and Putnam (2002) suggested, a child’s temperament as it interacts with the
environment is likely a better predictor of developmental outcomes than temperament
26
alone. Environmental pressures within the social context, especially at an early age,
provide the structure around which temperamental dispositions will be modified. In
evaluating the associations between parental personality and child temperament, it is
thus essential to pay attention to the period of infancy and the early appearance of the
child’s temperamental characteristics that will strongly affect the child’s concurrent and
subsequent behavior.
The continuity estimates of childhood temperament reported so far (Putnam et al.,
2008; Rothbart et al., 2000b) also leave room for contextual factors. In other words,
instead of conceptualizing temperament as a set of highly stable traits inherent in the
child, its continuity, especially in terms of self-regulative functions, can be seen as
relating to the child’s social environment (Rothbart & Bates, 2006). Accordingly, the
development of infant temperament has consistently been shown to be affected by,
besides genetic influence, the unique environment of the child (e.g. Goldsmith, Lemery,
Buss & Campos, 1999; Propper & Moore, 2006; Stright, Gallagher, & Kelley, 2008).
Among the most significant contextual elements in a child’s environment are
parental characteristics. Given the role temperament plays in later behavior and
adjustment problems, testing the effects of parental personality on their child’s
temperament (e.g., Rothbart et al., 2000; Caspi, 2000), along with their influence in
proximal interactions (Crockenberg & Smith, 2002; van den Boom & Hoeksma, 1994)
and in various other processes in the child’s development (e.g., Kochanska, 1997) is of
particular importance.
In terms of parental extraversion and neuroticism, previous studies have revealed that
parents with high extraversion and low neuroticism display more positive, supportive,
and responsive parenting and less negative, controlling parenting (Belsky & Barends,
2002; Belsky, Crnic, & Woodworth, 1995; Clark, Kochanska, & Ready, 2000; Losoya,
Goldsmith, Callor, & Rowe, 1997; Metsäpelto & Pulkkinen, 2003). In contrast, parents’
high neuroticism is often found to be associated with less sensitive, less affective and
less stimulating parenting (Belsky et al., 1995). Associations between higher parental
extraversion and more positive evaluations and more positive outcomes of the child, as
well as between higher parental negative affectivity and neuroticism and more negative
evaluations and outcomes of the child have also been hitherto quite consistently
established (e.g., Belsky et al., 1991; Gartstein & Marmion, 2008; Kochanska et al.,
27
2004; Kurdek, 2003; Propper & Moore, 2006). In general, no significant differences in
the effects of parent-related determinants on maternal and paternal behavior have been
detected (Metsäpelto & Pulkkinen, 2003; Verhoeven, Junger, Van Aken, Dekovic, &
Van Aken, 2007).
1.4.3 Child temperament and parental situational factors: the case of parental stress Besides parents’ own personality- or temperament-related psychological characteristics,
situational factors within the parents’ life may also have a significant effect on parental
feelings and behavior within a family, and especially within the parent’s relationship
with the child. Despite the origin of those situational experiences, i.e., whether they
originate from within or outside of the family, parents’ individual interpretations of and
feelings related to those experiences may further influence the parents’ and the child’s
behavior at home.
Because parents in modern societies are under various pressures, one of the most
important and influential situational factors in an adult’s life may be the amount of
perceived stress. Stress in the family context, especially when that stress is chronic and
present early in the child’s development, can further have detrimental effects on the
wellbeing of the family and the quality of parent–child relationships. Accordingly, the
existing literature shows associations between parental parenting-, daily-, life-event, and
other environment-related stress and parent- and/or teacher-reported child behavioral
problems, adjustment difficulties, and internalizing or externalizing problems in the
early childhood period (Anthony et al., 2005; Conger, McCarty, Yang, Lahey, & Kropp,
1984; Coplan, Bowker, & Cooper, 2003; Creasey & Reese, 1996; Deater-Deckard &
Scarr, 1996; Kliewer & Kung, 1998; Peterson & Hawley, 1998).
However, the majority of research in this area has mainly focused on a specific
concept, ‘parenting stress’, that is defined in terms of dysfunctional parent–child
interaction, parental anxiety or depression, and ‘difficult’ or challenging child-behavior
characteristics (Abidin, 1990; Crnic & Greenberg, 1990). This kind of parenting stress
does not necessarily reflect the more global appraisal of stress that may result from
various life domains other than parenting (e.g., work and marital discord). The existing
evidence, however, implies that it is not only stress that is roused by parenting
28
experiences that may have an influence on family functioning, parental behavior and
dyadic interaction between a parent and a child at home (Crnic, Gaze, & Hoffman,
2005; Deater-Deckard & Scarr, 1996).
The stability of parental stress is an assumption that seems to underlie much of the
research within the field, although, due to the relative lack of longitudinal research, it
has not been established to any reliable extent. As in studies of adult personality, studies
of parental stress show greater stability for shorter time periods between assessments
(Crnic et al., 2005). In the study of Mulsow and her colleagues (2002), maternal
parenting stress was shown to be stable between the child’s ages of 15 and 36 months
(Mulsow, Caldera, Pursley, Reifman, & Huston, 2002), and in the recent Rantanen et al.
(2008) study, parenting stress of mothers and fathers with children living at home
showed moderate to high stability, but was more stable across a one-year period than
across a six-year period (Rantanen, Kinnunen, Feldt, & Pulkkinen, 2008). Further, in
Crnic et al. 2005, two indices of maternal stress, namely experiences of major life
events and parenting daily hassles, appeared to be stable over two years across the
preschool period: stressed mothers at child age three were likely to report higher stress
at child age five. However, in the study of Östberg, Hagekull and Hagelin (2007), the
individual stability of maternal parenting stress over a six-year period in a clinical
intervention group with infant sleeping and feeding problems was only moderate,
decreasing slightly over time from infancy to the child’s age of six to seven.
Similar to the development and over-time stability reported for the more
constitutionally based characteristics of child temperament and parental personality
traits, the stabilities found for the level of parental stress make it clear that there is
ample room for change. The parents’ experience of overall stress can increase or ease
off over time, and many parents do change; the intriguing question is whether these
changes can be predicted from some internal family factors. The idea of being able to
predict or define some typical correlates of change in parents’ experience of stress
makes the efforts to identify such factors within a family an exciting area for inquiry.
1.4.3.1 Implications of child temperament for parental stress
In evaluating the associations between parental stress and child temperament, periods in
infancy and early childhood are again considered to be of greatest importance.
29
Concurrent associations between so called ‘difficult temperament’ and parenting stress
have provided evidence in support of the notion that infant difficultness can undermine
parental functioning (Belsky, 1984; Belsky, Rha, & Park, 2000; Calkins et al., 2004;
Collins, Maccoby, Steinberg, Hetherington, & Bornstein, 2000; Gartstein & Sheeber,
2004; Heinonen et al., 2006; Kochanska et al., 2004; Rubin et al., 1999; van den Boom
& Hoeksma, 1994), although evidence concerning these effects is not altogether
coherent (Putnam, Sanson & Rothbart, 2002; Rothbart, 1986). In terms of concurrent
associations between early temperament and parental stress, Gelfand, Teti and Fox
(1992) reported a significant association between the mothers’ parenting stress and
difficult temperament among three- to 13-month-old infants. Mulsow and her
colleagues (2002) also reported a significant association between maternal parenting
stress and infant difficultness at one month, but not at six or 15 months, and Honjo and
his colleagues (1999) found maternal child-rearing stress to be related to infant-
temperamental difficulty at 18 months, but not at six months. Associations between
parental stress and child temperament have also been reported among 21-month-old
toddlers (Östberg & Hagekull, 2000) and among 48-month-old children (Coplan et al.,
2003).
However, the possible over-time effects of the child’s initial temperamental
characteristics on the parents’ stress experience remain largely unexplored. With regard
to specific caregiving-related problems during infancy, namely problems with feeding
and sleeping, it has been shown that parenting stress at the child’s age of six to seven
can, at least partly, be predicted by these early child and family problems and associated
early stress (Östberg et al., 2007). It can thus be assumed that, similar to the changes in
parental self-concept and personality characteristics induced by the parenting role
(Cowan et al., 1991; Roberts et al, 2005; Paris & Helson, 2002), the parental role may
also be accompanied by changes in the level of parental experience of stress over time.
The existing evidence further shows, that mothers and fathers are generally more
similar than different in their specific levels of stress experience (Creasey & Reese,
1996; Deater-Deckard & Scarr, 1996) and associated experiences (Deater-Deckard,
Scarr, McCartney, & Eisenberg, 1994). For example, Crnic and Booth (1991) reported
no differences in the absolute number or intensity of the everyday parenting hassles that
mothers and fathers experienced. The stability of parental stress and the associations
30
between stress and child outcomes have also generally been shown to be independent of
the parent’s or child’s gender (Mulsow et al., 2002; Rantanen et al., 2008; Räikkönen et
al., 2006).
1.4.3.2 Implications of parental stress for child temperament
Both parental overall stress and parenting-related stress have been proven to be
significant predictors of parent and child behavior and dyadic interaction (e.g.,
Bergman, Sarkar, Glover, & O'Connor, 2008; Conger et al., 2002; Crnic et al., 2005;
Repetti & Wood, 1997), but so far only a few studies have investigated the associations
between a more global experience of parental stress and child temperament. Especially
in terms of early temperament, the causality of associations between parental stress and
infant/child temperament over time is, to a large degree, still an unexplored area.
Support for the idea that it is parenting stress that plays a causal role in the
emergence of problematic child temperament is provided by the evidence of predictive
associations between maternal prenatal stress and subsequent negative views of the
child’s temperament and mental health morbidity. Huizink and her colleagues (2002)
reported associations between increased maternal prenatal and/or postnatal stress and
infant ‘unadaptability’ (Huizink, Robles de Medina, Mulder, Visser, & Buitelaar, 2002).
In the same cohort, increased levels of maternal prenatal stress further appeared to be
associated with temperamental and behavioral problems at the child’s age of two years
(Gutteling et al., 2005). Likewise, in the study of Pesonen and her colleagues (2005),
mothers who reported continuous high stress from the pre- to the postnatal period over
six months perceived the temperament of their six-month-old infants as more negatively
and less positively tuned than did mothers who experienced increasing, decreasing or
continuous low stress over the same periods. Maternal stress across child ages two to
three years has also been shown to play a causal role in the emergence of problematic
child behavior (Belsky et al., 1996). Also in the recent studies of Robinson, Oddy et al.
(2008) and Bergman, Sarkar et al. (2008), high or increasing stress during pregnancy
was predictive of child mental health morbidity or fearfulness in toddlerhood and at the
age of five.
In terms of a more global experience of stress, evidence of the predictive link
between parental overall stress and subsequent child temperament can be drawn from
31
the above-mentioned studies of prenatal stress (Bergman et al., 2008; Huizink et al.,
2002; Pesonen et al., 2005; Robinson et al., 2008). Further, Räikkönen and her
colleagues (2006) reported associations between parents’ higher perceived global stress
and more negatively tuned perceptions of the child’s temperament during infancy. In the
study of Crnic, Gaze and Hoffman (2005), the intercorrelation between two indices of
parental stress, namely more general life stress and more specific parenting daily hassles
at the child’s age of three, was low, indicating that those two indexes of stressfulness
were predominantly independent, but they were both still predictive of parent and child
behavior and dyadic interaction at the child’s age of five. The authors thus concluded
that cumulative stress, resulting from parenting hassles or other life events, may build
across developmental periods to create an increased risk for parenting and child
functioning (Crnic et al., 2005).
However, studies that focus on the predictive associations between parental overall
stress and child temperament from infancy to childhood still seem to be lacking.
Further, even though temperament is a neutral construct that covers a wide variance of
behavior, there still seems to be a lack of longitudinal studies moving from global
‘child-difficultness’, or problematic behavior –measures to linking parental overall
stress with their perceptions of a wider range of infant/child temperamental
characteristics over time.
1.5 Aims of the study The overall aim of the current study was to examine the degree of continuity of
temperament over five years from the infant’s age of six months to the child’s age of
five and a half years, and to investigate the bidirectional effects between child
temperament and parents’ personality traits and experienced overall stress during that
time. Figure 1 shows the general outline of the current study.
32
Figure 1. General outline of the study. Roman numerals refer to individual substudies (please see the original list of publications on page 10) that have allowed examination of the specific research questions
1.5.1 Continuity of temperament from infancy to middle childhood
1.5.1.1 Study I. Continuity of mother-rated temperament
First, I addressed the question of temperamental continuity among 231 Finnish children
within the theoretical framework and operational definitions developed by Rothbart and
her co-workers (e.g., Rothbart & Bates, 2006; Rothbart et al., 2001). I assessed
differential homotypic and heterotypic continuity between individual subscales and
latent superconstructs of temperament as rated by the mother when the child was aged
six months and when the child was aged five and a half years. Based primarily on
Rothbart’s theory emphasizing developmental continuity and structural change of
temperament, and partly on the prior findings (Rothbart & Bates, 2006), I hypothesized
that all individual temperament subscales in infancy would show differential homotypic
and/or heterotypic continuity up until middle childhood.
33
As for the latent temperament superconstructs, I hypothesized that significant
continuities would be found between infant positive affectivity and middle childhood
extraversion, and between infant and middle childhood negative affectivity. I also
hypothesized that infant positive affectivity would predict effortful control in middle
childhood, as the positive affectivity construct contains early characteristics of self-
regulation, i.e. duration of orienting (Kochanska et al., 1998). Additionally, based on
previous literature on the associations between early activity and later extraversion
(Eaton, 1994; Hagekull & Bohlin, 1998), specific effects of infant activity were also
tested by including specific paths from infant activity to the middle childhood
superconstructs in the model of latent superconstructs.
Moreover, by taking an ipsative, person-level approach to temperamental continuity,
I aimed to explore whether temperament from infancy to middle childhood clustered to
form profiles indicative of the personality types characterized in research on personality.
As there are both empirical and conceptual links between temperament and personality
traits, I hypothesized that temperament in infancy and in childhood would cluster to
form profiles indicative of three different temperament types that would correspond
conceptually to the personality types consistently identified in childhood and adulthood,
i.e., the resilient, undercontrolled and overcontrolled personality types (Asendorpf et al.,
2001; Asendorpf & van Aken, 1999; Caspi & Silva, 1995; Robins et al., 1996). Infant
activity level was included as a separate dimension in the cluster formation.
I hypothesized that, first, the temperament type corresponding to the resilient type
would be marked by a relatively high level of positive emotionality in infancy and low
levels of negative affectivity both in infancy and in childhood, and relatively high
effortful control in childhood. Second, the temperament type corresponding to the
undercontrolled type would be characterized by relatively high levels of negative
affectivity both in infancy and in childhood, and a high level of extraversion and
relatively weak self-regulative capacities in childhood. Finally, the overcontrolled
temperament type would be marked by relatively high negative affectivity in infancy
and by low extraversion and relatively high self-regulative capacities in childhood The
level of infant activity was hypothesized to be positively associated with childhood
extraversion and, accordingly, be relatively high in the second, more undercontrolled
type, and low in the third, more overcontrolled type.
34
1.5.1.2 Study II. Continuity of father-rated temperament
Second, I aimed to fill the gap in our knowledge of father-rated temperamental
continuity from infancy to middle childhood within a sample of 115 father-infant-child
dyads. Within this second study, I also examined whether the developmental paths in
father-rated temperament were similar to those of mother-rated temperament within a
sample of 109 father–mother–infant/child -triads. The smaller sample size in father-
ratings, however, restricted me to the variable level analyses, and did not allow a
reliable enough ipsative level analysis.
Because mother- and father-rated temperament have, according to previous cross-
sectional data, been shown to be interrelated, and show a similar structural pattern in
infancy, toddlerhood and childhood, I hypothesized that father-rated temperament
would also show significant homo- and heterotypic continuity from infancy to five and
a half years of age. I also hypothesized that paternal and maternal ratings of
temperament would show congruent continuity.
1.5.2 Transactional development of parent and child characteristics from infancy to middle childhood
After demonstrating the continuity of parent-rated temperament in itself from infancy to
middle childhood, the next step of the present study was to capture the transactions
between parental characteristics and child temperament over the same period of time.
The bidirectional effects between child temperament and parental characteristics were
investigated in terms of parents’ personality traits and overall stress experienced during
that time.
1.5.2.1 Study III. Parental personality traits extraversion and neuroticism and
infant/child temperament
In the third study, I aimed to examine rank-order stability and transactional associations
between parents’ personality traits extraversion and neuroticism (McCrae & Costa,
1987; McCrae & John, 1992) and the parents’ views of their infant’s/child’s
temperament within a sample of 109 mother-father-infant/child triads. The stability and
change in parental extraversion and neuroticism were examined in relation to parent-
rated infant activity and sumscores of positive and negative affectivity and ratings of the
35
child’s temperamental sumscores extraversion, effortful control, and negative
affectivity.
In line with existing literature, parental extraversion and neuroticism were expected
to show high stability over five years. In terms of parental personality change, I
hypothesized that parental ratings of the infant’s higher positive affectivity would
predict an increase in parental extraversion and a decrease in neuroticism, and that
ratings of the infant’s higher negative affectivity would predict an increase in parental
neuroticism and a decrease in extraversion. Infant activity was examined with no
specific direction of change in parental personality hypothesized. Further, initially
higher parental extraversion was expected to predict higher parent-rated extraversion
and effortful control and lower negative affectivity in the child, and initially higher
parental neuroticism was expected to predict ratings of lower extraversion and effortful
control, and higher negative affectivity in the child.
1.5.2.2 Study IV. Mother’s overall stress and infant/child temperament
Next, I aimed to depict the over-time stability and transactional associations between
mothers’ perceived overall stress and infant/child temperament over the same time
period within a sample of 231 mothers and their infants/children. In this fourth study,
the first aim was to test the transactional associations between maternal stress and six
individual temperament subscales that represented conceptual equivalents in the infants’
as in the children’s temperament questionnaires. The subscales activity level,
anger/frustration, fear, soothability, attentional focusing, and smiling and laughter were
chosen for the analyses. Second, I aimed to test whether there were transactions
between maternal stress and the latent infant/child temperament superconstructs.
I hypothesized that temperament characteristics reflecting higher negative
emotionality and lower positive affectivity in infants would contribute to an increase in
maternal stress over five years beginning in infancy, and that higher maternal stress
would contribute to an increase in the child’s negative affectivity and a decrease in
positive affectivity characteristics and self-regulative functioning over the same period.
In sum, the current study first aimed at establishing the continuity of temperament
within a family context, as perceived by both parents, and examining whether the
developmental paths of infant/child temperament are similar in both parents’ eyes.
36
Second, the study aimed to examine the transactional associations between parental
personality traits of extraversion and neuroticism and infant/child temperament, and
further, explore the transactional development of maternal perceived stress and maternal
ratings of infant/child temperament over this five-year period.
37
2 METHODS 2.1 Outline of the study The ongoing Glaku project was initiated in 1998. It was designed to examine the
neonatal and early childhood predictors of hypertension development, as well as
normative psychological development in childhood. The Glaku project is a collaborative
study involving the Departments of Psychology and Medicine at Helsinki University,
and the Department of Pediatrics and Neonatology at Helsinki City Maternity hospital.
At the baseline of the study in 1998 the infants averaged six months of age (M= 6.3,
S.D. = 1.4 months). A follow-up was conducted five years later in 2003–2004, at which
point the children averaged five and a half years of age (M= 66.1, S.D. = 2.9 months).
These two time-points served as the sample for the current study. A second follow-up
was conducted in 2006, and a further follow-up will be conducted in 2009.
The initial study sample was collected between March 1st and November 30th of 1998
in Helsinki City Maternity hospital (Kätilöopiston sairaala). The hospital is one of the
principal maternity hospitals in Helsinki, with approximately 4500 births per year. The
midwives in four regular maternity wards were asked to give a questionnaire to all
women with singleton healthy births in which both parents were of Finnish origin.
During this period there were 2746 births that would have been eligible. For reasons
connected with the vacation period of the midwives, some mothers did not receive the
questionnaire (only 30 of the invited mothers refused to participate). However, it is not
likely that this involved selection bias, because the midwives were unaware of the exact
aims of the study (Strandberg, Järvenpää, Vanhanen, & McKeigue, 2001).
2.2 Participants In 1998, a total of 1049 mothers completed the questionnaire, which included questions
on antenatal stress and nutrition, and on other lifestyle variables, as well as a question
eliciting permission to examine their maternity records. Of these 1049 mothers, the first
500, along with the biological fathers of the baby, were invited to participate in a
psychological survey on child development.
Of these 500 families, a total of 328 (65.6%) family units (mother and/or father)
returned the questionnaire sent to them by mail approximately six months after the
delivery. Of these family units, data on both biological parents was simultaneously
38
available on 180 units, 141 questionnaires were returned only by the mother and seven
only by the father. In total, 321 mothers and 187 fathers returned the questionnaire.
Details of the research protocol and of the recruitment of the initial sample are described
in Strandberg et al. (2001). The participants in Studies I – IV were taken from the same
sample consisting of families that participated in the Glaku project at baseline in 1998
when the infant was six months of age and again at follow-up in 2003-2004, at the
child’s age of five and a half years. The institutional Review Board at the University of
Helsinki approved this project, and the participating parents gave their informed
consent.
A total of 231 mother-infant/child dyads providing data at both data-collection points
formed the sample for Study I. A total of 115 father-infant/child dyads, providing data
at both data-collection points formed the sample for the first aim of Study II, and a total
of 109 father–mother–infant/child triads, providing data at both data-collection points
formed the sample for the second aim of Study II. A sample of 109 mother-father-
infant/child triads providing complete parental and child data at both time points formed
the sample for Study III, and a total of 231 mother–infant/child dyads providing
complete parental and child data at both time points formed the Study IV sample.
2.3 Measures 2.3.1 Infant temperament
Parental ratings of infant temperament were derived using the Infant Behavior
Questionnaire (the IBQ, Rothbart, 1981). The questionnaire is designed to refer to
specific, concrete behaviors of the infant, occurring during the past week (previous two
weeks for some items).The 96 items in the IBQ are evaluated on a seven-point scale
reflecting the relative frequency of specified infant reactions. There are six subscales
(Rothbart, 1986). Activity level describes the level of the infant’s gross motor activity,
including movement of the arms and legs, squirming, and locomotor activity. Smiling
and laughter is related to expressions of joy. Soothability (the recovery parameter of
distress) is defined as the effectiveness of soothing techniques when the child is
experiencing negative affects. Duration of orienting refers to sustained involvement
with a single object or activity when there has been no sudden change in stimulation.
Distress to limitations refers to distress when goal achievement has been blocked or a
39
desirable object removed. Fear is expressed by crying or fussing and/or extended
latency to approach intense or novel stimuli.
Infant positive affectivity superconstruct has in previous studies been comprised of
slightly differing combinations of smiling and laughter, duration of orienting,
soothability and activity level (see, e.g., Goldsmith & Campos, 1990; Kochanska et al.,
1998; Rothbart, 1986; Worobey & Blajda, 1989), while distress to limitations and fear
have quite consistently been used in defining a negative affectivity superconstruct (see,
e.g., Kochanska et al., 1998; Rothbart, 1986). Infant activity has been shown to
associate, besides positive affectivity, with negative affectivity as well (Goldsmith &
Campos, 1990; Goldsmith et al., 1999; Kochanska et al., 1998; Lemery et al., 1999;
Rothbart, 1986; Worobey & Blajda, 1989).
The temperament superconstructs in the first, second and fourth study were devised
by defining the latent factors in the structural equation model, and in the third study by
computing the sumscores. The infant positive affectivity factor was defined by smiling
and laughter, duration of orienting and soothability, and infant negative affectivity was
defined by distress to limitations and fear, while infant activity was allowed to load on
both positive and negative affectivity latent factor in the structural equation model. In
the cluster analysis in Study I and in the multilevel analysis in Study III, infant positive
and negative affectivity superconstructs were computed as described in previous studies
(Kochanska et al., 1998; Rothbart et al., 2001), with the exception that infant activity
was not included in the superconstructs, but was used as a separate dimension in the
analyses.
Previous studies have reported good test-retest and alpha reliabilities for the IBQ
(Gartstein, Slobodskaya, & Kinsht, 2006; Gartstein & Rothbart, 2003; Rothbart, 1986).
Convergence between laboratory observation ratings of temperament and the IBQ scales
has also been reported (Bridges, Palmer, Morales, Hurtado & Tsai, 1993; Goldsmith &
Rothbart, 1991). In the current study the Cronbach’s alphas for the subscales ranged
from 0.74 to 0.93. Moreover, the confirmatory factor analyses conducted in Studies I
and II confirmed the construct validity in the Finnish sample.
40
2.3.2 Child temperament
Parental ratings of the child’s temperament were elicited by using the Children’s
Behavior Questionnaire (the CBQ, Rothbart et al., 2001). The 195 items in the CBQ are
evaluated on a seven-point scale reflecting the relative frequency of specified child
reactions in concrete situations in previous weeks. There are 15 subscales. Activity level
describes the level of the child’s gross motor activity. Anger/Frustration refers to
negative affectivity related to the interruption of an ongoing task, or goal blocking.
Approach anticipation refers to the amount of excitement and anticipation expressed
toward expected pleasurable activities. Attentional focusing refers to the capacity to
maintain attentional focus on task-related channels. Discomfort means negative
affectivity related to sensory qualities of stimulation, including intensity, rate, and
complexities of light, movement, sound and texture. Falling reactivity and soothability
(the recovery parameter of distress) is the rate of recovery from peak distress,
excitement, or general arousal. Fear is expressed by negative affectivity including
unease, worry or nervousness, which is related to anticipated pain or distress and/or
potentially threatening situations. High intensity pleasure refers to enjoyment related to
situations involving high stimulus intensity, rate, complexity, novelty, and incongruity.
Impulsivity is the speed of response initiation. Inhibitory control is the capacity to plan
and to suppress inappropriate approach responses under instructions or in novel or
uncertain situations. Low intensity pleasure means enjoyment related to situations
involving low stimulus intensity, rate, complexity, novelty, and incongruity. Perceptual
sensitivity is the detection of slight, low-intensity stimuli from the external
environment. Sadness refers to negative affectivity and lowered mood and energy
related to exposure to suffering, disappointment, and object loss. Shyness refers to slow
or inhibited speed of approach and discomfort in social situations. Finally, Smiling and
laughter is related to positive affect in response to daily happenings.
According to Rothbart et al. (2001), high levels of impulsivity, high intensity
pleasure, activity level, smiling and laughter, and positive anticipation, and a low level
of shyness form an extraversion superconstruct; high levels of low intensity pleasure,
inhibitory control, perceptual sensitivity and attentional focusing form an effortful
control superconstruct; and high levels of fear, sadness, discomfort, and
anger/frustration and a low level of soothability form a negative affectivity
41
superconstruct. These superconstructs were devised in the current study by defining the
latent factors in the structural equation models and computing the sumscores. Previous
studies have reported good test-retest and alpha reliabilities for the CBQ (Rothbart et
al., 2001). In the current study, the Cronbach’s alphas for the subscales ranged from
0.65 to 0.90. Moreover, the confirmatory factor analyses conducted in Studies I and II
confirmed the construct validity in the Finnish sample.
2.3.3 Parental personality traits Parental personality traits were assessed on the extraversion and neuroticism scales
derived from the authorized adaptation of the NEO personality inventory (NEO-PI;
Costa & McCrae, 1985; Pulver, Allik, Pulkkinen, & Hämäläinen, 1995). The self-report
questionnaire contains 48 items measuring extraversion and 48 items measuring
neuroticism, and these 96 items were included in the assessment of parental personality
at both time points. Extraversion is defined in terms of warmth, gregariousness,
assertiveness, activity, excitement-seeking and positive emotions, and neuroticism in
terms of anxiety, anger, depression, self-consciousness, impulsiveness, and
vulnerability. The items are scored on a five-point Likert scale (strongly disagree to
strongly agree), and support for the validity and reliability of the domains has been
consistent (Costa & McCrae, 1992; McCrae & Costa, 1987). In the current study, the
Cronbach’s alphas for extraversion and neuroticism ranged from .91 to .94 at both data-
collection points.
2.3.4 Perceived stress
The mothers self-reported their level of perceived overall stress approximately six
months postpartum and again five years later using the shortened version of the original
14-item perceived stress scale (the PSS; Cohen, Kamarck, & Mermelstein, 1983). PSS
is sensitive to chronic stress deriving from ongoing life circumstances, expectations
concerning future events, or from any life-events. The items are designed to tap the
degree to which respondents find their lives unpredictable, uncontrollable, and
overwhelming. These three issues have been repeatedly found to be central components
of the experience of stress (Cohen et al., 1983).
42
The short version, constructed as suggested by Cohen and his colleagues (1983),
consisted of the four items that were originally most highly correlated with the 14-item
scale: the scale thus includes statements such as ‘How often have you found that you
could not cope with all the things that you had to do’ and ‘How often have you felt that
you were on top of things (a reversed item)’. In the current study, an additional fifth
question, derived from the original scale, asking directly about the level of experienced
stress was added: ‘In the last month, how often have you felt nervous and stressed’?
Mothers evaluated the degree to which they had appraised situations in their lives as
stressful (unpredictable, uncontrollable, overwhelming) in recent weeks on these five
items, using a scale ranging from never (1) to all the time (5). The scale has shown good
reliability and validity in prior studies (Cohen et al., 1983). Cronbach’s alpha in the
current study was .79.
2.4 Statistical analyses Structural equation modeling was the main statistical method used in all four studies.
Several analyses were used for comparative purposes, such as the t-tests for independent
and dependent variables. In Study I, the k-means clustering algorithm was used to test
how the study variables (sumscores) in infancy and in middle childhood clustered to
profiles. Univariate analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used in verifying that the
clusters were significantly different on the criterion variables. Structural equation
modeling and path analyses were performed using the Mplus statistical package 2.13-
4.1 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998 - 2006). Standard model-fitting procedures and the
maximum-likelihood-estimation method were adopted. Table 1 summarizes the
information on participants, research design, measures, and main statistical analyses in
the current study.
43
Table 1. Sample, research design, measures and main statistical methods used in Study I – IV Study Participants Measures Main statistical methods
I N=231 mother-
infant/child -dyads
Baseline 1998, infant age 6 months: Infant Temperament Questionnaire (IBQ) Follow-up 2004, child age 5 ½ years: Children’s Behavior Questionnaire (CBQ)
Confirmatory factor analysis, Structural equation modeling, t-test for independent samples, k-means clustering algorithm, ANOVA, post hoc t-tests (Pearson correlations)
II N=115 father-
infant/child-dyads; N=109 father–
mother–infant/child-
triads
Baseline 1998, infant age 6 months: Infant Temperament Questionnaire (IBQ) Follow-up 2004, child age 5 ½ years: Children’s Behavior Questionnaire (CBQ)
Confirmatory factor analysis, Structural equation modeling, t-tests for independent and dependent samples, (Pearson correlations)
III N=109 mother-father-
infant/child- triads
Baseline 1998, infant age 6 months: Infant Temperament Questionnaire (IBQ) NEO personality inventory (NEO-PI) Follow-up 2004, child age 5 ½ years: Children’s Behavior Questionnaire (CBQ) NEO personality inventory (NEO-PI)
Confirmatory factor analysis, Structural equation modeling multilevel technique, t-tests for independent and dependent samples, (Pearson correlations)
IV N=231 mother-
infant/child- dyads
Baseline 1998, infant age 6 months: Infant Temperament Questionnaire (IBQ) Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) Follow-up 2004, child age 5 ½ years: Children’s Behavior Questionnaire (CBQ) Perceived Stress Scale (PSS)
Confirmatory factor analysis, Structural equation modeling, (Pearson correlations)
44
3 RESULTS The main results of the four separate studies are summarized below. The details are to
be found in the original publications.
3.1 Study I. Continuity of mother-rated temperament from
infancy to middle childhood 3.1.1 Continuity of temperament subscales and superconstructs Pearson correlations were computed to test differential homotypic and heterotypic
continuity between the individual subscales of temperament measured in infancy (IBQ)
and in middle childhood (CBQ) over five years (Table 2). Activity level, smiling and
laughter, distress to limitations and fear showed significant homo- and heterotypic
continuity from infancy to middle childhood, whereas there was evidence only of
heterotypic continuity for soothability and duration of orienting. Heterotypic continuity
was shown, for example, between higher infant activity and later aspects of extraversion
(e.g. approach anticipation and high-intensity pleasure) and between higher infant
smiling and laughter and later low-intensity pleasure, and between higher levels of
infant distress to limitations and fear and later sadness. Associations indicating
developmental interaction between traits that are controlled by separate genetic
mechanisms were also shown, for example, between higher infant soothability and later
high-intensity pleasure, and between higher infant fear and lower levels of low-intensity
pleasure and smiling and laughter in middle childhood.
Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to verify the factor structures of infant
positive and negative affectivity (Kochanska et al., 1998) and middle childhood
extraversion, effortful control and negative affectivity latent superconstructs (Rothbart
et al., 2001), and the confirmed factor structure was used as a foundation for the
structural analyses. Figure 2 shows the a priori hypothesized model including all
possible paths from the positive and negative affectivity latent superconstructs in
infancy to the extraversion, effortful control and negative affectivity latent
superconstructs in middle childhood.
The positive affectivity latent superconstruct in infancy predicted extraversion and
effortful control in middle childhood, while negative affectivity in infancy predicted
45
negative affectivity in middle childhood. The model showed an adequate fit ( 2/df = 1.9;
RMSEA= 0.06; CFI = 0.914), and temperament in infancy accounted for 4.6, 22.3 and
6.0% of the variance in extraversion, effortful control, and negative affectivity in middle
childhood, respectively.
An additional SEM involving the specific effects of infant activity, as an addition to
paths from infancy to middle childhood latent superconstructs, is presented in Figure 3.
The model with specific effects of infant activity showed an acceptable fit ( 2/df = 1.9;
RMSEA= 0.06; CFI = 0.922), and the 2 difference test showed that the model with the
specific effects of infant activity fitted the data significantly better than the initial a
priori hypothesized model that did not involve the specific effects. The model involving
specific effects revealed significant paths from infant activity to later extraversion and
negative affectivity, while the path to effortful control was not significant. In this
model, infant temperament accounted for 8.1, 23.0, and 11.7% of the variance in
extraversion, effortful control, and negative affectivity in middle childhood,
respectively. Adding the specific paths of infant activity in the model eliminated the
significant path from infant positive affectivity to extraversion.
46
Table 2. Pearson correlations between the temperament subscales measured in infancy and in middle childhood (N = 231 mother-infant/child-dyads)
p < .05. * p < .01. **
Figure 2. Structural equation model showing associations between latent temperament superconstructs measured in infancy and in middle childhood. Standardized values are given for the path coefficients. All the nonsignificant paths are also presented ( 2/df = 1.9; RMSEA= 0.06; CFI = 0.914)
Infancy: IBQ Activity
Level Smiling / Laughter
Soothability Duration of Orienting
Distress to Limitations
Fear
Middle childhood: CBQ
Activity Level .26** .09 .05 .01 .02 .03 Anger/Frustration .02 -.05 .03 .04 .16* .12 Approach/ Anticipation
.17** .29** .20** .19** -.01 -.00
Attentional Focusing
-.10 .10 .12 .05 -.01 -.12
Discomfort -.03 -.12 -.02 -.00 .16* .10 Falling Reactivity & Soothability
-.01
.20**
.06
.07
-.34**
-.11
Fear -.05 -.04 -.04 .01 .16* .23** High-Intensity Pleasure
.18** .09 .15* .01 .02 -.08
Impulsivity .25** .08 .14* -.01 .02 .05 Inhibitory Control -.13* .02 .06 .08 -.07 -.05 Low-Intensity Pleasure
.05 .20** .11 .08 -.02 -.14*
Perceptual Sensitivity
.01 .20** .12 .26** -.09 -.03
Sadness -.05 .01 .05 .11 .14* .18** Shyness -.17* -.06 -.11 .02 .09 -.02 Smiling/Laughter .20** .34** .15* .13* -.11 -.19**
47
Figure 3. Structural equation model showing associations between latent temperament superconstructs measured in infancy and in middle childhood, with specific paths from infant activity to the middle childhood superconstructs included in the model. Standardized values are given for the path coefficients. All the nonsignificant paths are also presented ( 2/df = 1.9; RMSEA= 0.06; CFI = 0.922)
3.1.2 Person-level continuity of temperament: “temperament types”
A k- means clustering algorithm was used to test whether the temperament
superconstructs (sumscores) in infancy and in middle childhood cluster to form
theoretically meaningful and coherent profiles representing different temperament
types. The reliability of the cluster solution was tested as recommended by
Breckenridge (2000) and Mandara (2003), by examining whether a statistically
significant agreement existed in a cross-validation between two randomly divided
cluster solutions. As separate SEM and cluster analyses for girls and boys did not show
substantial differences, all the analyses were conducted with gender groups combined.
Three “temperament types”, illustrated in Figure 4, profiling infants and children
throughout the five-year-period were found: children belonging to the first cluster,
named as “resilient”, were characterized by above-average levels of activity, positive
affectivity, extraversion and effortful control, and below-average levels of negative
affectivity in infancy and middle childhood (n = 73). Those in the second cluster, named
“undercontrolled”, were characterized by an above average level of activity and a
48
below-average level of positive affectivity in infancy, by above-average levels of
negative affectivity in infancy and middle childhood, by an above-average level of
extraversion, and a well below average level of effortful control in middle childhood
(n = 79). Those in the third cluster, named “overcontrolled”, were characterized by a
well below average level of activity and a below-average level of positive affectivity,
and an average level of negative affectivity in infancy. In middle childhood, they
exhibited above-average levels of effortful control and negative affectivity, and well
below the average level of extraversion (n = 79).
Figure 4. Cluster analysis identifying three temperament “types” based on sumscores of temperament superconstructs measured in infancy and in middle childhood. Note. All ps < 0.001 in ANOVAs testing the significance of differences between the clusters; all ps < 0.001 in post hoc pair-wise comparisons, except for p = 0.34 between “resilient” and “undercontrolled” in activity; p = 0.45 between “undercontrolled” and “overcontrolled” in positive affectivity; p = 0.04 between “undercontrolled” and “overcontrolled” in infant negative affectivity; ps = 1.0 between “resilient” and “undercontrolled” in extraversion and between “resilient” and “overcontrolled” in effortful control; p = 0.08 between “undercontrolled” and “overcontrolled” in childhood negative affectivity
49
3.2 Study II. Continuity of father-rated temperament and
congruence between mother- and father-rated continuity 3.2.1 Continuity of father-rated temperament subscales and superconstructs Pearson correlations were computed to test differential homotypic and heterotypic
continuity between the individual subscales of temperament measured in infancy (IBQ)
and in middle childhood (CBQ) over five years. Father-rated activity level, smiling and
laughter and distress to limitations showed significant homo- and heterotypic continuity
from infancy to middle childhood, whereas there was evidence only of heterotypic
continuity for soothability, duration of orienting and fear (Table 3). Heterotypic
continuity was shown, for example, between higher infant smiling and laughter and
later low-intensity pleasure and between higher infant distress to limitations and later
discomfort and fear. Associations indicating developmental interaction between
different traits were also shown: for example, higher infant activity level associated with
lower levels of inhibitory control and soothability in middle childhood, and higher
infant fear and distress to limitations associated with lower levels of control-related
abilities and less smiling and laughter in middle childhood.
The CFA presented in the first study was used in verifying the factor structures of
latent infant and child temperament superconstructs, and the confirmed factor structure
was used as a foundation for the structural analyses. In the SEM, father-rated positive
affectivity in infancy was shown to predict, as hypothesized, effortful control in middle
childhood, but it did not predict later extraversion. The SEM with fit indexes is
illustrated in Figure 5. As hypothesized, negative affectivity in infancy predicted
negative affectivity in middle childhood, but also showed a developmental trend
towards a low level of effortful control. The respective variances accounted for by
father-rated positive and negative affectivity in infancy were 5.1, 22.7, and 10.0% for
extraversion, effortful control and negative affectivity, respectively.
As in the first study, when infant activity was added to the model as a specific path,
the significance of a high level of infant activity as a specific determinant of later
extraversion was revealed (Figure 6). The predictive associations between negative
affectivity in infancy and in middle childhood and between positive affectivity and later
effortful control were not affected by the specific activity path. For fathers, adding the
50
specific effect of infant activity improved the fit of the model only slightly ( ²(1) = 3.8,
p > .05).The variances accounted for by activity and positive and negative affectivity in
infancy in this additional model were 8.0, 23.7, and 9.8% for extraversion, effortful
control and negative affectivity, respectively.
Table 3. Pearson correlations between the father-rated temperament subscales measured in infancy and in middle childhood (N = 115 father-infant/child dyads)
Infancy: IBQ Activity
Level Smiling/ Laughter
Soothability Duration of Orienting
Distress to Limitations
Fear
Middle childhood: CBQ
Activity Level .19* .06 .07 -.10 .03 .01 Anger/Frustration .20* -.12 .00 -.04 .27** .14 Approach Anticipation
.14
-.09
-.03
.09
.16
-.05
Attentional Focusing
-.13
.19*
.10
.09
-.11
-.11
Discomfort .01 -.04 -.14 .08 .08 -.04 Falling reactivity & Soothability
-.20*
.20*
-.01
.02
-.23*
-.15
Fear -.08 -.05 .05 .07 .18* .10 High-Intensity Pleasure
.13
-.04
.15
-.01
.06
.02
Impulsivity .11 -.02 .17 -.16 .14 -.04 Inhibitory Control
-.27**
.17
.02
.07
-.31**
-.17
Low-Intensity Pleasure
-.01
.30**
.19*
.27**
-.14
-.19*
Perceptual Sensitivity
-.03
.16
.01
.21*
-.13
-.27**
Sadness -.05 -.18* -.16 -.02 .06 .02 Shyness .01 -.11 -.14 -.04 .05 .18 Smiling/ Laughter .04 .23* .16 .07 -.12 -.27**
p < .05. * p < .01. **
51
Figure 5. Structural equation model showing associations between father-rated latent temperament superconstructs measured in infancy and in middle childhood (n = 115). Standardized values are given for the path coefficients. All the nonsignificant paths are also presented ( 2/df = 1.3; RMSEA= .05; CFI=.927)
Figure 6. Structural equation model showing associations between father-rated latent temperament superconstructs measured in infancy and in middle childhood, with the specific path from infant activity to the middle childhood extraversion superconstruct included in the model. Standardized values are given for the path coefficients. All the nonsignificant paths from infant negative and positive affectivity latent superconstructs are presented 2/df = 1.3; RMSEA= .05; CFI = .931)
52
3.2.2 Congruence between mother- and father-rated continuity of
temperament Congruence between parents’ ratings was investigated within a sample of 109 mother-
father-infant/child –triads. Fathers rated their infant higher than mothers in fear,
duration of orienting and negative affectivity, and in middle childhood, they rated their
child higher in activity and impulsivity, and lower in approach anticipation, low-
intensity pleasure, perceptual sensitivity, smiling and laughter and effortful control.
Significant agreement between parents’ ratings of individual temperament subscales,
except for soothability in infancy was shown (Table 4). Paternal and maternal ratings
did not differ by child’s gender.
At the level of temperament subscales, continuity of father-rated temperament was
compared with the continuity shown for mothers in Study I. In terms of homotypic
continuity, the predictive associations in the father-ratings were similar to mother-rated
continuity in the first study. In terms of heterotypic continuity, similar developmental
tendencies were also shown, for example, between early activity and later aspects of
extraversion, between early smiling and laughter, soothability and duration of orienting
and later aspects of effortful-control, and between early distress to limitations and later
fear.
Indicators of developmental interaction between different traits were also similar, for
example, between early negative affectivity -subscales and lower levels of effortful
control -related subscales and smiling and laughter. Some difference in the salience of
associations between specific infant and middle childhood subscales could also be
detected; for example, father-rated infant distress to limitations and fear showed more
salient inverse associations with later effortful control –related subscales.
At the level of latent temperament superconstructs, no statistically significant
differences between the father- and mother-rated predictive paths between infancy and
middle childhood were found. Figure 7 displays the predictive paths between mother-
and father-rated latent temperament superconstructs from infancy to middle childhood,
including the specific effect of infant activity. The developmental links between
affectively positive and well adjusted characteristics in infancy (i.e., smiling and
laughter, orienting capacities and soothability) and later effortful control were especially
noteworthy in both father- and mother-ratings, being in line with the literature on the
53
associations between positive affectivity and well functioning, adaptive control abilities.
However, even though no statistically significant difference existed between mother-
and father-rated paths, the developmental link between higher infant negative affectivity
and a lower level of effortful control in middle childhood was more pronounced in
father-ratings.
Table 4. Mean values of the infant’s (IBQ) and 5.5 -year-old child’s (CBQ) temperament variables separately for the mothers (n = 109) and the fathers (n = 109), comparisons of the variables within couples, and intraclass correlations between parents’ ratings of their child
Mothers Fathers t (paired) r (intraclass) M SD M SD Infancy: IBQ Activity level 4.54 0.79 4.59 0.69 -0.55 .45** Smiling/Laughter 5.25 0.82 5.35 0.78 -1.09 .53*** Soothability 4.95 1.03 4.80 1.15 1.09 .25 Duration of Orienting 3.77 1.10 4.10 1.17 -2.59* .46** Distress to Limitations 2.92 0.70 3.05 0.69 -1.84 .61*** Fear 2.16 0.65 2.33 0.68 -2.17* .47** Superconstruct sumscores Positive Affectivity 4.66 0.71 4.75 0.80 -1.04 .39** Negative Affectivity 2.54 0.56 2.69 0.57 -2.46* .58*** Middle childhood: CBQ Activity level 4.68 0.78 4.82 0.75 -2.13* .74*** Anger/Frustration 3.81 0.92 3.80 0.83 0.20 .66*** Approach/Anticipation 5.27 0.64 5.06 0.57 3.71*** .69*** Attentional Focusing 5.16 0.76 5.17 0.69 -.06 .64*** Discomfort 3.70 0.98 3.57 0.83 1.50 .65***
Falling Reactivity & Soothability
5.12 0.79 4.96 0.67 1.96 .46**
Fear 3.63 1.02 3.50 0.84 1.40 .64*** High-Intensity Pleasure 4.96 0.86 4.94 0.80 0.20 .72*** Impulsivity 4.21 0.87 4.40 0.75 -2.82** .77*** Inhibitory Control 5.18 0.87 5.03 0.80 1.48 .46** Low-Intensity Pleasure 5.81 0.61 5.51 0.56 4.46*** .41** Perceptual sensitivity 5.32 0.85 5.09 0.66 2.95** .67*** Sadness 3.49 0.84 3.41 0.69 0.94 .52*** Shyness 3.20 1.17 3.24 1.08 -0.53 .81*** Smiling/Laughter 5.86 0.59 5.65 0.66 2.90** .44** Superconstruct sumscores Extraversion 4.96 0.53 4.94 0.51 0.67 .85*** Effortful Control 5.37 0.56 5.20 0.49 2.98** .56*** Negative Affectivity 3.50 0.70 3.46 0.57 0.59 .62***
p < .05. * p < .01. ** p < .001***
54
Figure 7. Structural equation model showing associations between latent temperament superconstructs measured in infancy and in middle childhood for mothers (n = 109) and fathers (n = 109), with the specific path from infant activity to the middle childhood extraversion superconstruct included in the model (path coefficients: mother/father). All the nonsignificant paths from infant negative and positive affectivity latent superconstructs are presented. Note. While the SEM allowing for father- and mother-rated across-time paths to form freely fitted the data well ( 2/df = 1.3; RMSEA= .05; CFI = .902), so did the model where the across-time paths were constrained ( 2/df = 1.3; RMSEA= .05; CFI = .901); the 2 difference test demonstrated no significant difference between these two models. In addition to intra-parental across-time paths, the models also specified cross-parental across-time paths. None of the cross-parental paths between the latent superconstructs were significant, and are, for the clarity of illustration, excluded from the figure
3.3 Study III. Developmental transaction between parental
personality traits and child temperament Preliminary analyses of the concurrent associations between study variables
demonstrated significant agreement between parents’ ratings of the child’s temperament
that also increased over time, while no association between maternal and paternal
personality traits extraversion and neuroticism within a family was shown. At baseline,
mothers’ and fathers’ higher extraversion correlated significantly with higher infant
positive affectivity, rs = .23 and .35, respectively, and parents’ higher neuroticism with
higher infant negative affectivity, .23 and .46, respectively. At follow-up, mothers’ and
fathers’ higher extraversion correlated significantly with higher child effortful control,
rs = .24 and .26, respectively, and for fathers also with higher child extraversion,
55
r = .24 and for mothers with lower child negative affectivity, r = -.19. Mothers’ and
fathers’ higher neuroticism correlated significantly with higher child negative
affectivity, rs = 42 and .35, respectively, and for fathers, with lower child effortful
control, r = -.22 (for mothers, this association was nearly significant).
There were significant over-time Pearson correlations between parental personality
and infant/child temperament: mothers’ and fathers’ higher extraversion at baseline
associated significantly with the child’s higher effortful control five years later, rs = .24
and .20, respectively, and the parents’ higher neuroticism at baseline associated with the
child’s higher negative affectivity five years later, rs = .34 and .25, respectively. The
infants’ higher positive affectivity associated significantly with the mothers’ and
fathers’ higher extraversion 5 years later, rs = .29 and .42, respectively, and the infants’
higher negative affectivity associated with parents’ higher neuroticism, rs = .19 and .39,
respectively (for mothers, the association was nearly significant), and with lower
extraversion in fathers, r = -.25.
Multi-level analysis: Before proceeding to the multi-level analysis, a 2 -significance
test was performed showing that the cross-lagged paths between parental personality
and the infant’s/child’s temperament were similar in the maternal and paternal ratings
(p >.10). The multilevel model including statistically significant paths of the
stability/homotypic continuity of parental personality and the heterotypic continuity of
child’s temperament, and the statistically significant cross-lagged paths between the
child’s temperament and parental personality over five years are presented in Figure 8.
The model showed an excellent fit ( 2 /df =1.6; RMSEA =.05; CFI =.989).
While parental personality (ps <.001) and child temperament (ps <.01) showed
significant continuity over five years, the infant’s higher positive affectivity
significantly predicted higher parental extraversion five years later (p <.001), and higher
infant activity significantly predicted lower parental neuroticism (p <.05) after five
years. The infant’s negative affectivity did not significantly predict parental
extraversion or neuroticism after five years.
Further, initially higher parental extraversion significantly predicted the child’s
higher level of effortful control over time (p <.05), but the association between parental
and child extraversion did not reach statistical significance. Initially higher parental
56
neuroticism significantly predicted the child’s higher negative affectivity (p <.001),
after controlling for the infant’s initial temperament.
In addition to these cross-lagged effects, the model further revealed parallel changes
in parental personality and the child’s temperament: decreases in parents’ views of the
levels of the child’s extraversion and effortful control (ps <.05) and an increase in views
of negative affectivity (p <.001) were significantly associated with an increase in
parental neuroticism. Changes in parental views of the child’s temperament were not
significantly associated with changes in parental extraversion at the follow-up. When
the analyses were re-run with the gender of the child as a predictor of parental
personality and the child’s temperament at the follow-up, no gender effects on the
results were found.
Figure 8. A multilevel structural equation model showing the associations between parental extraversion and neuroticism and infant/child temperament ( 2/df=1.6; RMSEA=05; CFI=.989). In the interest of clarity, only the statistically significant paths (p<.05) are presented. The values stand for unstandardized estimates and standard errors
57
3.4 Study IV. Transaction between maternal stress and child
temperament 3.4.1 Transaction between maternal stress and individual temperament subscales Maternal stress measured in the infancy period correlated significantly with maternal
stress five years later, r = .48, and mother’s initially higher stress was also correlated
with the infant’s higher fear r = .18, distress to limitations, r = .31, and lower smiling
and laughter r = -.15. Maternal higher stress experience in middle childhood correlated
with the child’s higher fear, r = .21, and anger, r = .21, and with lower soothability,
r = -.18, and attentional focusing, r = -.14.
In the SEM, only one infant temperament subscale significantly predicted change in
maternal stress over five years: a higher level of infant activity predicted a decrease in
maternal stress from infancy to middle childhood when stress in the infancy period was
controlled for (p <.05). Maternal stress in the infancy period did not predict a change in
child activity from infancy to childhood when the activity level in infancy was
controlled for (Figure 9).
Maternal higher stress predicted, as hypothesized, an increase in child anger (p <.05)
and a decrease in attentional focusing (p <.05) and soothability (p <.001), when the
initial infant temperament dimensions were controlled for. Attentional focusing, anger,
and soothability did not predict any changes in the maternal stress experience when
stress in the infancy period was controlled for.
Figure 9. Change in maternal stress predicted by infant activity level. Standardized values are given for the path coefficients
58
3.4.2 Transaction between maternal stress and latent temperament
superconstructs The factor structure for the latent superconstructs of positive affectivity and negative
affectivity in infancy, and for those of extraversion, effortful control, and negative
affectivity in middle childhood were confirmed in Study I and II. Figure 10 shows the
path coefficients for a transactional model of maternal stress and latent temperament
constructs in infancy and middle childhood. The model gave a good fit to the data 2/df = 1.6; RMSEA = .04; CFI = .92), and showed that maternal stress experience in
the infancy period predicted an increase in negative affectivity from infancy to middle
childhood when initial infant negative affectivity was controlled for, but it did not
predict extraversion or effortful control in middle childhood when infant temperamental
affectivity was controlled. Infant positive and negative affectivity did not predict any
changes in maternal stress experience over time.
Figure 10. A Transactional model of maternal stress and infant and child temperamental superconstructs. Straight lines are statistically significant * p < .05, *** p < .001. Note. Non-significant paths have been omitted from this final model with the exception of the path for the continuity from infant to child negative affectivity that controls for the continuity in estimating the change in negative affectivity ( 2/df = 1.6, RMSEA = .04, CFI = .92)
59
4 DISCUSSION The current study aimed, first, to establish the continuity of temperament from the
infant’s age of six months to the child’s age of five and a half years as perceived by both
parents, and examine whether the developmental paths of infant/child temperament are
similar in both parents’ eyes. Second, the study aimed to explore the transactional
development of parental personality traits extraversion and neuroticism and ratings of
infant/child temperament. Further, the transactional associations between parental more
situational characteristics, namely maternal perceived overall stress, and ratings of
infant/child temperament over this five-year period were examined.
4.1 Continuity of parent-rated temperament from infancy to middle childhood The present study conceptualized temperament as constitutional individual differences
in reactivity and self- regulation, influenced over time by the interactions of heredity,
maturation, and experience (Rothbart & Bates, 2006). Compared to, for example, the
early stylistic framework of Chess and Thomas (1986), and the more dimensional
approaches that identify basic temperamental traits, like Buss and Plomin’s (1984)
genetically based emotionality-activity-sociability model, Goldsmith’s primary-
emotion-based reactions (Goldsmith et al., 1987), or Kagan’s (1994) individual
differences in behavioral inhibition to the unfamiliar, the present conceptualization of
temperament also included self-regulative processes that serve to modulate (enhance or
inhibit) reactivity (Rothbart & Bates, 2006). As the arousal and intensity of basic
emotions and reactions in the child’s life are influenced by the child’s regulative
capacities, defining and measuring these capacities supplements the picture of
temperament and the measurement of predictive associations between early and later
temperament and adjustment.
Besides depicting temperament as a within-person characteristic, temperament was
also presented as an interactive construct. First, the child’s expressed temperament is
assumed to affect and be affected by others; for example, the child’s level of reactivity
may not stay the same during development, but be permanently and profoundly changed
by regulative capacities that develop within interaction with the developmental context.
Second, developmental interaction between temperamental behaviors that are controlled
60
by separate genetic mechanisms is also acknowledged; for example, the child’s
developing regulative capacities may affect the child’s tendency to express fear or
distress over time, or negative affectivity may also downplay the development of
effortful control.
In the present study, theoretically relevant associations between temperamental
dimensions at six months of age and at the age of five-and-a-half years were shown, and
the results of the homotypic and heterotypic continuity of individual temperament
subscales as perceived by both parents were, to a great extent, similar. Significant
homotypic continuity was shown for infant activity level, smiling and laughter, distress
to limitations and fear (nearly significant in father-ratings), while significant heterotypic
continuity was shown for infant soothability and duration of orienting in both parents’
ratings. In general, the continuity of temperament subscales from infancy to middle
childhood fulfilled the criteria of heterotypic continuity or coherence, reflecting, besides
over-time stability, also theory-based lawful change (Caspi & Roberts, 2001):
associations of infant temperament were found with phenotypically different but closely
correlated attributes, i.e., with attributes belonging to the same temperament
superconstruct in middle childhood, and subscales belonging to the broad categories of
infant positive and negative affectivity showed differential developmental paths. It
must, however, be acknowledged, that in Rothbart’s more recent work, a more fine-
grained measure of infant temperament has been developed (Gartstein & Slobodskaya,
2003); if this more recent version of IBQ with more subscales had been used, some of
the present heterotypic continuities might even have proved to be homotypic in nature.
As an example of heterotypic continuity, higher ratings of infant activity level
predicted, besides higher activity in middle childhood, also aspects of later extraversion,
e.g., approach anticipation and high-intensity pleasure, especially in mother-ratings.
However, higher infant activity also showed developmental associations with a lower
level of inhibitory control and, especially for fathers, with a higher tendency to express
anger and less ability to soothe oneself. In developmental research, a high activity level
has typically been associated with the development of extraversion, but also to
impulsivity and poor behavioral control in young children (Hagekull & Bohlin, 1998;
John, 1990; see also Caspi et al., 2005; Eaton, 1994). The present associations are thus
in line with previous research, linking the activity-aspect of surgency with anger and
61
externalizing behavior (Putnam & Stifter, 2005; Rothbart et al., 2001; Rothbart et al.,
2000b). With the father, the child’s initially higher activity level may have, more often
than with the mother, resulted in manifestations of this less controlled and more
negative aspect of extraversion. For example, during a more active, outgoing and
challenging interaction with the father (Paquette, 2004), even an active and energetic
infant/child may be also susceptible to frustration and anger.
Higher infant smiling and laughter in maternal and paternal ratings also predicted
aspects of effortful control, like a stronger tendency to get pleasure from low-intensity
stimuli, and higher levels of self-soothing and attentional capacities. This sign of
positive affectivity in the infant may be a marker of self-regulatory capacity, i.e. reflect
the developmental change from a largely reactive dimension in infancy towards a more
effortfully controlled behavior in the service of cultural standards during childhood
(Ahadi et al., 2003; Putnam et al., 2001; Rothbart et al., 2001). Early positive affect may
also allow for the development of self-regulation by allowing more frequent encounters
with experiences that are cognitively and affectively challenging, leading to greater
opportunities to develop willful control, or, it may be that infants who display more
positive emotionality elicit guidance from parents that may facilitate the development of
attentional skills underpinning effortful control (Putnam et al., 2008).
For infant fear and distress to limitations, that reflect the broad construct of negative
affectivity, especially the associations of infant distress to limitations with a broader
range of characteristics of negative affectivity in middle childhood supported earlier
findings, showing different paths of development from infant fear and
frustration/distress-proneness (Derryberry & Rothbart, 2001; Goldsmith et al., 1999;
Rothbart et al., 2000b). Further, while higher infant distress/frustration predicted later
fear, depicting heterotypic continuity in both parents’ ratings, it also predicted lower
soothability, while initially higher fear, in turn, predicted also fewer signs of low
intensity pleasure and smiling and laughter in both parents’ ratings. These inverse
associations between early negative affect and later difficulties in the ability to recover
from distress or excitement and a lack of expressed positive affect are in concordance
with the suggestions of developmental interaction between traits, i.e., that
temperamental negative reactivity may compromise the effective development of
62
attentional and inhibitory mechanisms, or that early negative reactivity may
compromise the development of expressions of positive affect (Putnam et al., 2008).
Further, the heterogeneity of subscale-level behaviors, reflecting common underlying
processes suggests the value of aggregating across narrowly delineated temperament
characteristics. Accordingly, at the level of latent temperament superconstructs, no
statistically significant differences between the mother- and father- rated predictive
paths between infancy and middle childhood were found. The developmental links
between affectively positive and well adjusted characteristics in infancy (i.e., smiling
and laughter, orienting capacities and soothability) and later effortful control were
especially noteworthy in both parents’ ratings, being, again, in line with the literature on
the associations between positive affectivity and well functioning, adaptive control
abilities. These early-emerging tendencies to focus attention, to enjoy calm activities,
and benefit from parental soothing may also contribute to later regulation of negative
emotions (Gaertner, Spinrad, & Eisenberg, 2008; Gartstein & Rothbart, 2003; Putnam et
al., 2008; Robins, John, Caspi, Moffitt, & Stouthamer-Loeber, 1996; Rothbart et al.,
2001).
Continuity of negative affectivity from infancy to middle childhood was also
consistently shown in father- and mother-rated temperament. However, for the father-
rated high negative affectivity (i.e., distress to limitations and fear) in infancy, a
developmental trend towards low levels of effortful control-related characteristics (e.g.,
inhibitory control, low-intensity pleasure, perceptual sensitivity) in middle childhood
appeared, as also in subscale-level associations, somewhat more emphasized. Here, too,
early negative reactivity can be assumed to compromise the development of effortful
control (Putnam et al., 2008). It has, for example, been suggested that excess crying
during early infancy may hamper the development of self-regulatory skills (Stifter &
Spinrad, 2002).
In developmental literature, it has been shown that the child’s self-regulative
capacities develop and manifest in transaction with the caregiving environment (e.g.,
Cole, Teti, & Zahn-Waxler, 2003; Eisenberg, Zhou, & Spinrad, 2005; Feldman,
Greenbaum, & Yirmiya, 1999), and some variance in parent ratings of the
manifestations of effortful control has been suggested to emerge due to caregivers’
unique experiences with the child (Putnam et al., 2006; Carson & Parke, 1996; Paquette,
63
2004). Parental agreement of the child’s effortful control in the current study was also a
bit lower than for the other scales, a trend seen in other research as well: effortful-
control-related characteristic are suggested to be somewhat less discernible or more
variably expressed in the presence of different interaction partners (Majdandzic & van
den Boom, 2008).
While the child’s temperament is the same, where ever the child is, its overt
manifestations may, to some extent, depend on the circumstances. In that respect, it can
be suggested that mothers and fathers elicit somewhat different aspects of their child’s
temperamental behavior in their individual style of interaction with the child. Due to
these behavioral differences in the contexts of relationships, both parents can also be
“right” about their child’s temperament, while the two views may represent somewhat
different aspects of reality, especially in the characteristics of effortful control.
For example, observations comparing father–child and mother-child interaction have
found that fathers frequently engage in play behaviors aimed at making the child more
excited (see Paquette, 2004). Hence, with a playfully stimulating father, who may
actively encourage the child’s exploration of the environment, these amplifying
interactions may ultimately reach a limit; the over-stimulation of a more fearful or
distress-prone infant/child may lead to a situation where the child’s control abilities do
not quite meet the challenge. Some children may also find it more difficult to calm
down the emotional aftermath of the situation (Paquette, 2004; Parke, 1994; Rorthbart
et al., 2001). Further, the traditional role of fathers may, in some families, mean that the
father usually interacts with the infant/child after his day at work, i.e., in the evening
time, when the child’s mood and control abilities, as well as energy level may vary as a
function of fatigue.
Further, in the combined model of 109 fathers and 109 mothers, the predictive
association between high activity and later extraversion (c.f. Eaton, 1994) was similar,
but it did not reach statistical significance. However, in the models involving only
mothers (n = 231) or only fathers (n = 115), the paths from infant activity to later
extraversion were statistically significant. This predictive path from early activity to
later extraversion was also shown in the recent study of Putnam and his colleagues
(2008), where infant’s higher activity was associated with later characteristics belonging
under the construct of extraversion (activity, high-intensity pleasure, impulsivity).
64
Enriching and complementing the current study, the person-centered approach
(Asendorpf & van Aken, 1999; Bergman & Magnusson, 2001) to continuity of mother-
rated temperament types further showed that temperament characteristics in infancy and
in middle childhood clustered to form profiles indicative of three theoretically-based
temperament types: relatively high levels of activity and positive characteristics in
infancy and a lack of negative affectivity in infancy and middle childhood clustered in a
type labeled as “resilient”. High activity in infancy and high negative affectivity in
infancy and middle childhood, combined with relatively weak child self-regulative
capacities, clustered in a type labeled “undercontrolled”. Furthermore, characteristics of
infant activity and positive affectivity that did not rise to the average, accompanied with
an average level of infant negative affectivity and with low childhood extraversion and
relatively high levels of effortful control and negative affectivity clustered in a type
labeled “overcontrolled”. These three profiles parallel the three widely established types
depicting personality in childhood and in adulthood, namely the resilient,
undercontrolled, and overcontrolled profiles, respectively (Asendorpf et al., 2001;
Asendorpf & van Aken, 1999; Caspi & Silva, 1995; Robins et al., 1996).
The current results thus provide further support for the continuity of childhood
personality types by offering a theoretically fruitful way of illustrating how the infant
and childhood temperament characteristics cluster to form stable temperament types that
resemble personality types shown in personality research. The distinction between the
internalizing (“overcontrolled”) and the externalizing (“undercontrolled”) negative
affectivity in the profiles is likely to be related to the level of the infant’s initial activity,
and to the activity of approach and self-regulation systems. The less intensive, relatively
passive and fearful children may, for instance, begin to regulate their fear through
inhibition (Kochanska & Knaack, 2003; van Brakel, & Muris, 2006) which, along with
the originally low activity level, serves to further restrict approach behaviors and overt
expression and sharing of affect. Inhibition may also begin to attenuate the child’s
positive affect, resulting in internalizing emotions (Derryberry & Rothbart, 1997).
It has also been suggested that extraversion (high activity and approach tendency)
gives direction to manifestations of negative emotions in frustrating situations: while a
high level of extraversion may lead the child to increase his or her external force, a
lower level of extraversion may lead to more internalized reactions (Putnam et al., 2001,
65
2008). The different types of negative affectivity are thus assumed to result from
combined initial reactivity and developmental interactions between reactivity and self-
regulation (Derryberry & Rothbart, 1997, 2001).
4.2 Developmental transaction between parent and child
characteristics 4.2.1 Transactional development of parental personality traits and child temperament The continuity estimates of infant/child temperament reported in the first two studies
still leave room for contextual factors. Thereby, the third study aimed at complementing
our knowledge of reciprocal child-to-parent and parent-to-child effects in the
development of temperament and parental personality traits. More specifically, I
examined stability and change in parental self-rated personality traits of extraversion
and neuroticism in relation to the parents’ views of their child’s temperamental
affectivity sumscores and activity level from the infant’s age of six months to the
child’s age of five and a half years.
The concurrent and over-time correlations between parental personality and child
temperament were essentially similar in both parents’ ratings, but also showed some
differences in the salience of associations. Both parents’ higher extraversion at both
time points associated with the infant’s higher positive affectivity and the child’s higher
effortful control, and fathers’ higher extraversion at follow-up also associated with the
child’s higher extraversion, while mothers’ higher extraversion at follow-up associated
with the infant’s/child’s lower negative affectivity. This may be suggested to reflect the
fathers’ more playful and exploration-encouraging interaction with the child (Paquette,
2004), that may elicit similar behavior from the child; for mothers, positive interaction
with the child may attenuate the risk of overstimulation-related negative affect. Further,
the over-time associations between infant’s higher negative affectivity and parental
lower extraversion and higher neuroticism at follow-up were more salient for fathers:
the infant’s higher negative affect may have reduced the opportunities for paternal
positive interaction with the child, resulting in lower paternal extraversion and higher
neuroticism five years later. However, when the differences in the mother- and father-
rated cross-paths between parental personality and the infant’s/child’s temperament
66
were tested, no statistically significant differences between maternal and paternal
ratings were shown.
In the final multilevel model, parents’ self-rated personality traits extraversion and
neuroticism exhibited the expected high stability over five years, but also changed over
time in relation to parents’ views of their child’s temperament. As hypothesized,
perceiving the infant as higher in positive affectivity predicted an increase in parental
extraversion over five years. Furthermore, parental views of the infant’s higher activity
level predicted a decrease in parental neuroticism over five years. Higher infant
negative affectivity was not, however, significantly associated with an increase in
parental neuroticism or a decrease in extraversion.
Johnson et al. (2005) proposed that stability and intensification of a personality trait
may result from a combination of genetic and continuing environmental influences.
This goes well with the current results showing an increase in parental extraversion in
response to perceived higher infant positive affectivity. Trait extraversion in itself
associates with attention to positive interpersonal information and feedback (Uziel,
2006). Living with a temperamentally positive child may have acted as an
environmental constancy factor for the extraverted parent (Fraley & Roberts, 2005;
Sameroff, 1995), thus contributing to the stability of and increase in parental
extraversion. The more extraverted parent may also have engaged in a parent–child
interaction that fits and strengthens his/her own extraversion-related characteristics
(Scarr & McCartney, 1983).
To understand the predictive association between the infant’s higher temperamental
activity and a decrease in parental neuroticism, the potential significance of the infant’s
activity for the parent–child relationship should be considered. First, children’s activity
level has been shown to be relatively stable from infancy onwards in the current data as
in other studies (Putnam et al., 2006), and it may therefore be considered an important
and enduring component at the core of the parent–child relationship. This characteristic
of the relationship, stemming from the infant’s constitutional characteristics, is also
beyond the control and selection of the parent (Johnson et al., 2005). Second, active
infants have also been shown to be in less need of adult stimulation, with respect to the
development of their cognitive abilities and mastery motivation (Wachs, 1987, 1992) or
exploratory behavior (Gandour, 1989). Thereby, with an initially active infant, the
67
effects that parental neuroticism might have on the interaction with the child may not be
able to reduce the infant’s lively and initiative behavior towards the parent.
In personality research, the closest parallel to temperamental activity is perhaps in
the energy or activity dimension within the extraversion factor (McCrae & John, 1992).
Because high temperamental activity has thus been shown to underpin later extraversion
(Blatny, Jelinek, & Osecka, 2007; Eaton, 1994; Hagekull & Bohlin, 1998), the child’s
initially higher activity may also be accompanied by higher levels in other extraversion-
related characteristics like positive affect, approach anticipation, lack of shyness and
sociability (Blatny et al., 2007; Rothbart et al., 2001). In the current data, the infant’s
activity was, likewise, more strongly associated with the infant’s positive than negative
affectivity. These extraversion-related characteristics of temperament have also been
shown to be highly stable over the early years (Berdan, Keane, Calkins, 2008). Like a
more active child, a child high in positive reactivity may also become activated at lower
levels of parental stimulation (Rothbart, 1986).
On the other hand, as Neyer and Lehnart (2007) propose, higher neuroticism may in
itself include a high motivation for change. It is also important to acknowledge that
higher parental neuroticism and related characteristics do not necessarily or
automatically decrease the positive qualities of parenting, such as parental
responsiveness, tracking, or compliance to the children (Kochanska et al., 2004). It may
be suggested that an infant, seen by the parent as high in activity, may promote positive
qualities in a parent, or offer a chance for change by continuously challenging the parent
to be more active and responsive. This process between the parent and the child could,
over time, facilitate a change for the better in the parent’s neuroticism-related
characteristics and feelings.
One explanation for the lack of effect of infant negative affectivity in increasing
parental neuroticism could be that the negative affectivity factor comprises the separate
components of distress to novelty (fear) and distress to limitations. These
characteristics, which at the age of six months are not differentiated enough to show any
independent effects, may still differ somewhat in their overt expression, resulting in a
somewhat less consistent effect on feelings and behaviors related to parental
neuroticism (see e.g., Rubin et al., 1999). The existing literature does not report entirely
68
consistent associations between infant’s negative temperamental characteristics and
parenting experience either (Boivin, Pérusse, & Dionne, 2005; Rohtbart, 1986).
The current results further suggest that extraversion and neuroticism in adulthood
may differ in terms of their susceptibility to environmental influence (see Fleeson,
2007). In other words, experiences may differentially influence an individual’s
development, because the impact of the environment is mediated by individual
differences in the organism; even though Belsky’s differential susceptibility hypothesis
originally refers to differences in the susceptibility of individuals high or low in specific
temperament- or personality characteristics (Belsky, 1997), it could also be suggested
that temperament and personality characteristics per se, for example positive or negative
affectivity, activity, neuroticism or extraversion, are differentially susceptible to
environmental influence. Parental extraversion and neuroticism may thus differ in terms
of the degree to which parenting experiences in general may affect, i.e. increase or
decrease, the level of that trait. Or, developmental changes in these parental traits may
also differ according to specific environmental characteristics, like the child’s unique
temperament.
In terms of social investment theory, the parenting role comes with its own set of
expectations and contingencies that calls for behaving in a certain fashion (Roberts et
al., 2006a). In this study, the roles that the parents were committed to may have differed
according to their perceptions of temperamental differences in their children (see e.g.,
Paris & Helson, 2002; Sameroff & Fiese, 2000; Sirignano & Lachman, 1985), and these
roles may have also differently contributed to the patterns of continuity and change in
extraversion and neuroticism. It can also be suggested that parents may change simply
through learning generalization: while in the middle of the everyday interaction with the
child, parents observe themselves acting in a certain way, and gradually come to a
different opinion about themselves that eventually generalizes across domains (Roberts
et al., 2006a).
In Costa and McCrae’s personality model (McCrae et al., 2000), an individual’s self-
concept is considered largely as a function of basic temperamental tendencies. The
dynamic interaction of basic tendencies with the environment produces characteristic
adaptations that comprise, for example, social relationships, skills, and habits.
Successful coping with parenting situations with temperamentally unique children can
69
be assumed to require a permanent reorganization of one’s priorities and characteristic
adaptations to the environment: one could thus ask whether these characteristic
adaptations can, over time, moderate parents’ own feelings and behaviors, and thereby
also gradually modify their more ‘stable’ or basic self-concept, reflected in measures of
extraversion and neuroticism. Or, in other words, characteristics of extraversion and
neuroticism may shift over time along a continuous dimension extending from the
trait’s core to its surface, and the core trait may become more unstable due to significant
relationship experiences (Asendorpf & Van Aken, 2003).
In addition to showing evidence of change in parental personality, our findings
suggest that parents’ personality traits may change their views of their child’s
temperament over time. We found that parent’s own higher-rated extraversion promoted
higher ratings in the child’s effortful control, while higher parental neuroticism
promoted ratings of the child’s higher negative affectivity. These predictive associations
are well in line with the voluminous literature showing that the more positive parental
characteristics contribute positively to the child’s development, while the less favorable
parental characteristics may increase the risk for adverse development of the child (e.g.,
Gartstein & Bateman, 2008; Propper & Moore, 2006; Spinrad et al., 2007; Stright et al.,
2008). For example, parents’ extraversion-related positive affect during play may
stimulate children’s interest in a task or refocus waning attention, as well as create a
positive environment that increases enjoyment of such efforts (Gaertner et al., 2008).
In this transactional setting, parents’ ratings of positive and negative affectivity in
infants also showed theoretically relevant heterotypic continuity over five years (see
also Putnam et al., 2008). The predictive paths between temperament sumscores, i.e.,
the paths from higher positive affectivity in infancy to higher effortful control in middle
childhood, and the paths from higher negative affectivity to lower effortful control and
higher negative affectivity in middle childhood were as hypothesized, and similar to
those shown between latent temperament sumscores in Studies I and II. In addition, in
the multilevel analysis, the infant’s higher negative affectivity sumscore also predicted
lower extraversion in middle childhood.
In recent literature, the construct positive affectivity has been shown to be a
heterogenic composite, associated concurrently and longitudinally with both
extraversion- and effortful control-related characteristics (Kochanska, Aksan, Penney,
70
& Doobay, 2007). The infant’s own basic predisposition to positive affect, along with
early signs of self-control, may explain the association between positive affect and
effortful control especially in the parent–child interaction (see Kochanska et al., 2007);
as suggested by Putnam and his colleagues (2008), early emerging tendencies to focus
attention and benefit from parental soothing may contribute to later regulation of
emotions, while positive affect (tendency to smile and laugh) may also lead the child to
experiences that promote the development of willful control and attention, or elicit
guidance from parents that facilitates the development of attentional skills underpinning
effortful control.
The stability of parents’ views of the child’s negative affectivity over five years may
reflect developmental continuity in the child’s negatively tuned reactions and behavior
within the family context, due to the child’s own constitutional characteristics, as well
as environmental characteristics (Scarr & McCartney, 1983). The path from the infant’s
perceived higher negative affect sumscore to lower extraversion and effortful control in
middle childhood may thus reflect initial difficulties in controlling fear and frustration
within everyday situations, or a developmental process where negative emotion and
attentional processes continually and mutually influence one another across time,
leading to a somewhat compromised development of attentional and inhibitory
mechanisms in the more negatively affective infant (Gaertner et al., 2008; Stifter &
Spinrad, 2002). At least, the challenge to control him- or herself and to approach new
situations may be harder for the easily frustrated or fearful infant.
In this transactional model, the child’s extraversion-sumscore did not contain aspects
of anger-frustration or self-control which, in the other three studies, loaded significantly
on the latent extraversion-superconstruct, presumably explaining the association
between higher infant negative affect and higher child extraversion in those three
studies. In this third study, the association between higher infant negative affectivity
and lower child extraversion-sumscore may be explained by predictive associations
between infant’s higher fearfulness and subsequent higher shyness and lack of
extraverted characteristics like approach anticipation and high-intensity pleasure.
I also examined whether parental personality and their views of the child’s
temperament showed parallel change over time (i.e., simultaneous change in parent and
child that was not explained by the predictive associations between infant and parent
71
characteristics at baseline and at follow-up). Obviously, I cannot determine which, that
is the parent or the child, or some other environmental or individual aspect of the parent
or the child promoted the change. However, I found that an increase in the ratings of the
child’s negative affectivity and a decrease in positive-affectivity- and attention-related
characteristics from infancy to middle childhood were associated with an increase in
parental neuroticism, while parental extraversion and infant/child temperament did not
show any parallel change. These associations are well in line with what is reported in
the literature (e.g., Belsky et al., 1991; Kochanska et al., 2004; Propper & Moore,
2006), and complement the picture of transactional development between parental
personality and infant/child temperament.
4.2.2 Transactional development of maternal stress and child temperament
In the fourth study, maternal perceived overall stress was considered as an important
situational factor that may, besides the more constitutional personality characteristics,
influence mothers’ behavior and feelings at home. Maternal overall stress also belongs
to the likely significant contextual elements in the early development of temperament,
even though the child’s temperamental characteristics may, in turn, also act as
significant contributors of stability or change in the level of mothers’ perceived amount
of stress. Therefore, the fourth study aimed to explore the longitudinal relations between
maternal perceptions of stress and mother-rated temperamental development of the child
from infancy to middle childhood.
Support for the hypotheses that mothers’ experience of overall stress would predict
an increase in mothers’ ratings of temperamental maladjustment over time, and at the
same time, mother-rated temperament traits in infancy would predict either an increase
or a decrease in maternal stress was found. However, these effects were not shown in
the same model, i.e., temperament did not influence and was not influenced by maternal
stress in the same model. These results essentially complement prior, mainly cross-
sectional, findings on the relations between parental stress and child behavior, by
extending the period in question to cover the most important developmental phases in
early childhood.
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Maternal experience of stress proved to be a rather stable mental state from the
infant’s age of six months to five and a half years. In terms of changes in maternal stress
over time due to child temperament, we found only one significant path from infant
activity level to decreased maternal stress in the childhood period, controlling for the
level of initial maternal stress. This finding that a decrease in maternal stress was
associated with the parents’ views of their infant as high in temperamental activity goes
well in line with the finding that higher infant activity also reduced parental neuroticism
over this five-years period, and justifies the suggestions of the potential significance and
favorable effects of the infant’s activity for the parent–child relationship.
The more energetic and active the child is, the more likely he/she will also be to
continue interaction-eliciting behavior with the mother, regardless of the mother’s level
of stress. Thereby, as in the case of parental neuroticism, the effects that maternal
overall stress might have on her behavior towards the child, for example a tendency to
withdraw from interaction (Repetti & Wood, 1997), may not be able to reduce the
infant’s lively and initiative behavior. For the mother, focusing on the active child may
serve as an everyday means of forgetting the other stresses of life: these less stressed,
frequently occurring and intensive moments between mother and child may thus
eventually attenuate maternal perceptions of her overall stress. Further, the more active
child may not raise as much worry in a parent as a child that seems more vulnerable,
timid or fearful does.
It seemed that the changes in temperamental development from infancy to middle
childhood originating in maternal stress during the infancy period were more prominent
than changes in maternal stress. Changes in temperament included an increase in anger
and a decrease in attentional focusing, as well as a decrease in soothability. At the level
of latent temperament superconstructs of positive and negative affectivity, defined as in
the first two studies, maternal stress in the infancy period predicted a higher level of
child negative affectivity over time when infant negative affectivity was controlled for.
These results are in line with prior knowledge of parent-effects on child development
(Crnic et al., 2005). Maternal stress is thus likely to affect temperamental development
in terms of both reactive (e.g., anger) and self-regulative functioning (attentional
focusing and soothability). Similarly, the increase found in temperamental negative
affectivity encompasses both internalizing aspects of child behavior (e.g., fearfulness,
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shyness, sadness, and discomfort) as well as indicators of low self-regulation (low
attentional focusing, low soothability, and low inhibitory control).
Earlier research has shown how parental stress experiences are related to parent–
child interactions (Patterson, 1983; Snyder, 1991). Repetti and Wood’s (1997) notion of
maternal withdrawal from the interaction due to stress is of particular interest with
reference to the current findings. It could be hypothesized that parental stress-originated
withdrawal reduces the moments of shared attention between the dyad, moments that
are essential for the development of attention and self-regulation (Morales, Mundy,
Crowson, Neal, & Delgado, 2005). In the current study, the predictive associations
between higher maternal stress and the child’s reduced attentional and self-soothing
capacities and ability to control anger/frustration complement these suggestions.
4.3 General conclusions The current longitudinal study provided evidence for the theoretically relevant
continuity of mother- and father-rated temperament from infancy to middle childhood,
within the developmental psychobiological framework of Rothbart and her colleagues
(Rothbart & Bates, 2006). It was also shown that the types characterizing childhood
and adulthood personality may share common ground with temperament types from
infancy onwards. Furthermore, the view that the development of children’s
temperament is also sensitive and differentially susceptible to variability in contextual
factors, represented in this study by parental personality traits and perceived overall
stress (Belsky, 1997; Van den Boom, 1994; Wachs, 2006), was also supported.
For the adult personality traits extraversion and neuroticism, high stability over five
years was shown. However, it was also shown that the unique environmental forces
within a family that individually affect temperamental development in a child may not
disappear in adulthood: the development of parents’ personality traits seemed to be
susceptible to their perceptions of the child’s temperament. Similarly, parents’
experience of more situational factors, represented in this study by maternal perceptions
of overall stress, also seemed to be susceptible to experiences with the child.
The continuities and associations between parents’ and infants’/children’s
characteristics found in this study were independent of child gender. The cross-lagged
paths between temperament and personality were also similar for mothers and fathers,
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fitting with evidence showing that the rank-order stability of adult personality (Caspi et
al., 2005), and the extent to which various environmental factors affect individual
differences in men’s and women’s personalities and associated characteristics (e.g.,
Ansell & Pincus, 2004; Costa & McCrae, 1988; Neyer & Asendorpf, 2001) are
unaffected by gender. In terms of stress, the associations between maternal stress and
child temperament were, as in previous studies (Deater-Deckard & Scarr, 1996), also
independent of child gender. While the current study investigated only maternal stress,
similar indications and associations can be assumed for both parents’ stress (Deater-
Deckard, & Scarr, 1996; Deater-Deckard et al., 1994).
4.4 Weaknesses and strengths of the study There are limitations to this study that that should be borne in mind in the interpretation
of the findings. First, there were no intermediate assessments of temperament between
infancy and five-and-a-half years of age available: intermediate assessments certainly
would have specified more exactly the developmental paths of temperament. For the
third and fourth study, examining the developmental transaction between parental
personality and stress and the child’s temperament, one limitation is related to the lack
of micro-level interactional patterns between parent–child dyads that would illuminate
the paths between the predictor and outcome variables in a more detailed fashion.
In temperament research, the question of objectivity in measuring child behavior
according to parental reports is also still open to debate (Kagan, 1994, 1998; Seifer et
al., 2004). Kagan (1998), for example, noted that parents may be prone to form an
unintended but consistent disposition towards the child, although the prior experiences
of the child may not have been that consistent. However, sources of observational error
exist also in artificial laboratory settings, for example errors related to the characteristics
of the rater, or effects of the situation or measure on child behaviors, or interactions
between rater characteristics and child behavior (Rothbart & Goldsmith, 1985). Further,
in the more objective assessment settings, only a limited set of behaviors can be evoked.
Especially in the case of positive affectivity, some children could be less likely to
express positive affect in the laboratory, relative to other more familiar settings where
the parents are able to see this behavior (Gartstein & Marmion, 2008; Rothbart &
Goldsmith, 1985). The unfamiliar laboratory setting may also make the child exhibit
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more fearful reactions than what is representative of his/her general level of fearfulness
in everyday life (Rothbart & Goldsmith, 1985). Accordingly, recent evidence points to
greater predictive validity and greater situational consistency of parent-ratings in
comparison to these more objective perceptions (Majdandzic & van den Boom, 2007;
Pauli-Pott et al., 2003). Because temperament exerts its effect on the child’s everyday
life, Rothbart’s measures also allow the empirical investigation of temperament in
various situations and social contexts. The possibility of parental inaccuracy and bias is
further minimized by asking for frequencies of recent, specific, and concrete behaviors
in response to common everyday stimuli (Rothbart, 1981; Rothbart et al., 2001). The
items in the infant and child behavior questionnaires are also worded in a simple and
straightforward manner, in order to minimize misinterpretation (Putnam et al., 2001).
The relatively small sample sizes and response rates in this study also restrict the
external validity of the findings. Especially, due to the inclusion criteria for family units
in Study II and III, i.e., both parents had to provide complete data on all of the study
variables at the baseline and at the follow-up, the drop-out rate was relatively high.
Even though the study sample was representative of the initial population,
generalizations should still be drawn with caution.
Further, using the same informant for parents’ as well as infant’s/child’s
characteristics evokes the question of shared method variance. However, the important
advantage of path analysis and the analysis of correlated change is that it reduces shared
method variance: because the path coefficients control for the indirect paths, which
contain the full bias, the error is, at least partly eliminated (Neyer & Asendorpf, 2001).
Beyond that, it should also be acknowledged that the causality between parent and child
cannot be considered straightforward enough to enable the isolation of any single factor
as the sole origin of a developmental outcome. In other words, the analyses of cross-
paths and correlated change in the present study are unable to provide conclusive
evidence of causal effects, because the study designs did not allow us to rule out
alternative explanations, such as the coaction of other, for example genetic- or
community-level -factors, that push the development forward.
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4.5 Theoretical and clinical implications Characteristics of personality and temperament are theoretically and empirically related
(Caspi et al., 2005; Rothbart et al., 2000a), and closely associated with individuals’ well
being and psychosocial adjustment (e.g., Auerbach et al., 2008; Costa & McCrae, 1980;
Eisenberg, et al., 2007; Hampson, 2008; Löckenhoff, Sutin, Ferrucci, & Costa, 2008;
Nigg, 2006; Ramos, Guerin, Gottfried, Bathurst, & Oliver, 2005; Roberts et al., 2007;
Steel, Schmidt, & Shultz, 2008). While no clear consensus yet exists concerning the
exact nature of temperament or personality, an integrated understanding of the
constructs, their development and associations with environmental influences and
various clinically relevant outcomes is of increasing interest for both researchers and
clinicians. Therefore, evidence of continuity, as well as every association between
changes in the child’s temperament and parental personality is both theoretically and
clinically meaningful.
In the current study, temperament and personality were seen as broadly overlapping
domains, with temperament providing the primarily biological basis for the developing
personality (Caspi et al., 2005; Costa & McCrae, 2000; Goldsmith et al., 1987; Rothbart
et al., 2000a). Besides the genetic association between temperament and personality
(e.g., Goldsmith et al., 1987), it was also acknowledged that temperament develops and
includes also later appearing elements, which further relates temperament to the
construct of personality. Temperament and personality were also considered most
meaningful in social contexts.
Thereby, the results of the current study were in line with the definition of
temperament as early appearing individual differences that; first, are relatively stable
across situations; second, are not all visible at birth, but become visible during time; and
third, are shaped by both hereditary and environmental factors. Interaction between
different temperament dimensions during development was also acknowledged. Further,
it was acknowledged that the same environment may have a unique influence on the
level of more than one dimension of temperament or personality at the same time.
For temperament, the results of the current study were in line with Rothbart’s
theoretical framework, highlighting especially the developmental coherence of positive
and negative affectivity, as well as the interplay between reactivity and self-regulation
in growth from infancy to middle childhood (Rothbart & Bates, 2006), from the
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perspectives of both of the child’s parents. The predictive validity of both parents’
ratings was also supplemented, which further emphasizes the importance of both
parents in developmental research. The confirmatory factor solution, shown to fit the
data well among six to seven years olds in Rothbart et al. (2001), was also replicated in
this Finnish sample. Thereby, as an additional contribution, the current study further
validated the measures and constructs of Rothbart and her colleagues (Rothbart et al.,
2001).
The individual level temperament profiles further illustrated how the common basis
of temperament and personality can be profiled in terms of infant/child temperament
dimensions. In a more practical or clinical sense, the resilient, under- and overcontrolled
temperament types showed how the early temperament variables may assume their
actual meaning in relation to other variables in an individual’s profile (Janson &
Mathiesen, 2008).
The current study also highlighted the relevance of temperament as a relational and
interactional construct (e.g., Rothbart & Bates, 2006), in which individual differences in
ways of regulating experiences are particularly susceptible to social influences. Instead
of conceptualizing temperament only as a set of traits inherent in the child, temperament
was, thus, also seen as a set of individual differences in the way children regulate
experience (Rothbart & Bates, 2006). In terms of theory-based change or lawful
discontinuity (Caspi & Roberts, 1999), the results of the present study were in line with
literature suggesting that the development of infant temperament, and especially the
characteristics related to the development of negative affectivity and attentional and
self-regulative capacities may be affected, besides genetic influence, by the unique
environment of the infant (Belsky, 1997; Belsky, Goldsmith et al., 1999; Hsieh, &
Crnic, 1998; Gilissen, Bakermans-Kranenburg, van IJzendoorn, & van der Veer, 2008;
Kochanska, 1995, 1997), here conceptualized as parental personality and experienced
overall stress.
For adult personality traits extraversion and neuroticism, theory-based high rank-
order stability over five years was shown (Roberts & DelVecchio, 2000; Terracciano et
al., 2006). However, despite high consistency, evidence of the possibility of
theoretically relevant non-normative change in these temperament-based personality
traits, due to important and enduring interpersonal relations (Neyer & Asendorpf, 2001;
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Robins et al., 2002) was also gained. More specifically, the current study suggests that
individuals seem to be able to maintain their level of extraversion, perhaps even in less
favorable environments, and be able to utilize a chance, at least in the form of the
child’s positive affectivity, to become more extraverted. In the case of neuroticism, and
also in the more situational experience of life as stressful, this study suggests that
individuals may be prone to detect reasons for decreasing the levels of these less
favorable behaviors and feelings (see Neyer & Asendorpf, 2001), while also the risk for
cumulative effects of the more negative parent and child characteristics seem to be true
for higher parental neuroticism and negatively tuned situational experiences like higher
parental overall stress.
The similarities found in the temperament-associations for neuroticism and stress are
understandable, as individuals who score high on neuroticism are also known to be
easily overwhelmed by stressful experiences (e.g., Costa & McCrae, 1992). However,
whereas self-ratings of neuroticism rise from a range of individual temperament-based
characteristics, parents’ perceptions of stress may also result from situational factors,
like objectively higher amounts of stressful phenomena in their life. Parental experience
of life as stressful, caused by either environmental or individual-level causes, may still
have a detrimental effect on the proximal processes between parent and child, evidenced
here as increases in negative aspects of child temperament.
In a transactional sense, the predictive associations and simultaneous change between
parent and child characteristics detected in this study may have involved both evocative
and reactive person–environment transactions that, within a family, may be suggested to
lead to discontinuities as well as continuities in temperament and personality, causing
simultaneous change (Scarr & McCartney, 1983). Or it may have been that parents and
children proactively created environments that fitted and strengthened their
characteristics, and these environments further promoted their genetically concordant
characteristics (Scarr & McCartney, 1983). The current study also provided evidence of
how these within-family experiences may differentially influence an individual’s
development, in terms of temperament- or personality-related differences in
susceptibility of unique environments in childhood as in adulthood. In terms of Belsky’s
(1984) ecological model, the idea of intertwined developmental influence between the
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three main classes of factors within a family, namely the parents’ own personality traits,
perceived overall stress and the child’s temperamental characteristics, was supported.
Considering the developmental relevance of parental views, it may be suggested that
the over-time continuity of parental views of the child’s temperament, and the
bidirectional influences between parent’s views of their own personality and the child’s
temperament may be those that matter the most, because this is the intimate and
enduring environment that is probably the most influential for both parent and child.
Whether parents’ individual characteristics shape their subjective interpretations of their
child or not, these interpretations are those that come to life between parent and child.
Similarly, parental perceptions of situational characteristics like overall stress can be
viewed as a combination of objective stressful events, coping processes and personality
factors that together form the outcome variable of perceived stress, which may then put
a strain on the everyday interaction of the parent and the child.
Further, considering the clinical relevance of early temperament, a child’s
temperament as it interacts with the environment, here conceptualized as the interaction
between parent and child characteristics may be a better predictor of developmental
outcomes than temperament alone (Rothbart & Putnam, 2002). Given the increasing
evidence of the influence of contextual characteristics upon central nervous system
development (e.g., Nelson & Bloom, 1997; Schore, 2001), it can be assumed that the
proximal processes between parent and child could also have an influence on the
constitutional underpinnings of temperamental characteristics. Within personality trait
theory, it is also acknowledged that an increased understanding of the mechanisms or
correlates of rank-order change in the temperament-based personality traits may further
allow the development of effective therapeutic interventions even during adulthood
(McCrae, 2001).
Furthermore, the predictive associations, along with the parallel changes in parents’
self-rated neuroticism and overall stress and the child’s temperament highlight the
importance of paying attention to the cumulative effects of parents’ self-representations
and the child’s temperament, at least when evaluating the developmental risks or
planning any therapeutic endeavors for a specific family (see e.g. Gartstein & Sheeber,
2004; Martorell & Bugental, 2006). Additional clinical relevance for recognizing the
negative cumulative effects of parent and child characteristics comes from the existing
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research showing that especially the more negative or challenging temperamental
characteristics in a young child are more susceptible to the harmful influence of less
optimal parental characteristics (Belsky, 1997).
However, the present study also suggests that, if offered a strong and enduring
enough environmental chance for change, parents’ and children’s reasonably stable
psychological characteristics may also be changed for the better. It may be proposed
that extraversion and individual temperament-dimensions linked with that trait can be
considered as buffering or protective factors in the child’s as well as in the adult’s life,
especially within their intertwined development during the child’s early years.
In sum, the current study showed that parent-rated temperament shows moderate to
high levels of continuity from infancy to middle childhood, and that the continuity of
mother- and father-rated temperament is quantitatively and qualitatively similar.
Theoretically relevant links between childhood temperament and personality types were
also shown. Furthermore, this study offered evidence of concurrent and predictive
bidirectional associations between child temperament and parental personality and
perceived stress. Thereby, this study also emphasizes the importance of paying attention
to the transactional effects of parents’ personality- and stress-related characteristics and
views of the child’s temperament, especially when evaluating the risks and protective
factors for a specific family.
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