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Risking it for Love: Romantic Relationships and Early Pubertal Development Confer Risk for Later Disruptive Behavior Disorders in African-American Girls Receiving Psychiatric Care

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Abstract

Disruptive behavior problems (DBP) represent a growing concern for young women (e.g., Snyder and Sickmund, 2006), but gender-specific investigations have been traditionally underrepresented in this area. The purpose of this study is to examine the associations among gender-relevant risk factors for DBP among 217 African American girls in psychiatric care. African American girls, 12–16 years old (M = 14.6; SD = 1.2), and their primary female caregivers (N = 254) were recruited from outpatient mental health clinics and reported on girls’ DBP, heterosexual dating experiences (romantic and sexual), peer relationships, pubertal development, and self-silencing at baseline, 6–, and 12 months. Structural Equation Modeling examined evidence for full versus mediated (via self-silencing) models and the structural relationships (direct and indirect) among key study variables. Results suggest that the full model was a significantly better fit than the mediated model as indicated by a Chi-squared difference test (p < 0.01). In the full model, direct effects of greater romantic dating experiences and lower quality peer relationships at baseline predicted DBP at 12 months. Sexual dating experiences were more strongly linked with DBP at 12 months for early maturing compared to average or later maturing girls. Indirect effects analyses suggested that girls’ suppression of relational needs, assessed through a measure of self-silencing, explained the association between peer relationships and DBP. Findings highlight the importance of the relational context for girls’ DBP, with treatment implications supporting relationship-based models of care, early intervention, and skill building around negotiating needs with peers and partners.

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Notes

  1. We conducted supplementary analyses using the 5-item measure of the PDS (which does not include the single-item measure of puberty meant to be utilized on its own) with the full model in MPLUS. These results suggest a poor fitting model (χ 2 = 221.2 (54), p < 0.05; CFI = 0.66, RMSEA = 0.12, SRMR = 0.09), though all substantive relationships remain the same, with the exception of the pubertal development by sexual dating experiences interaction, which does not reach significance (β = 0.04, p = 0.67).

  2. We conducted supplementary analyses to further examine the role of relative pubertal development, given theoretical and analytical reasons to suggest that the 5-item and single-item measures of the PDS are distinct. That is, the assessment of relative pubertal onset used in this study is a theoretically distinct construct than the 5-item composite measure of the PDS, with the former assessing the pubertal development of girls relative to their peer groups while the latter is an index of the extent to which girls’ have already gone through physical changes associated with puberty at the time of assessment (Petersen et al. 1988). Given these results, we conducted supplementary analyses (as suggested by Brooks-Gunn et al. 1987), in which we use the 5-item index of pubertal maturation as a covariate. We do so in order to examine the extent to which relative pubertal development is associated with disruptive behavior disorders above the influence of physical maturation alone. We find support for the original model reported in the manuscript, with all substantive relationships remaining the same (including the pubertal development by sexual experiences interaction) and an adequate model fit (χ 2 = 14.27 (54), p < 0.05; CFI = 0.93, RMSEA = 0.06, SRMR = 0.02). These results support the assertion that relative pubertal development is a distinct risk factor for girls’ disruptive behavior disorders, above the influence of physical maturation alone.

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health (R01MH065155). We thank the mothers and daughters who participated in the study, and gratefully acknowledge the administrators and clinical staff at the outpatient mental health clinics who worked with us to identify eligible families. These data reflect self-reported behaviors that place girls at risk for sexually transmitted infections, including HIV/AIDS, and may not represent girls’ willingness to engage in the behavior.

These results were presented at the 2012 Annual Meeting of the Association for Psychological Science, Chicago, IL.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. New York University, Department of Applied Psychology, 246 Greene St. Room 706 W, New York, NY, 10003, USA

    Shabnam Javdani

  2. University of Illinois at Chicago, Institute for Juvenile Research, 1747 W. Roosevelt Rd., Chicago, IL, 61820, USA

    Erin M. Rodriguez

  3. Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Abbott Hall, Suite 712, 710N. Lakeshore Drive, Chicago, IL, 60611, USA

    Sara R. Nichols

  4. University of Illinois at Chicago, School of Public Health - PI, 1603 W. Taylor Street (8th floor), Chicago, IL, 60612, USA

    Erin Emerson & Geri R. Donenberg

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  1. Shabnam Javdani
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  2. Erin M. Rodriguez
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  3. Sara R. Nichols
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  4. Erin Emerson
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  5. Geri R. Donenberg
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Correspondence to Shabnam Javdani.

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Javdani, S., Rodriguez, E.M., Nichols, S.R. et al. Risking it for Love: Romantic Relationships and Early Pubertal Development Confer Risk for Later Disruptive Behavior Disorders in African-American Girls Receiving Psychiatric Care. J Abnorm Child Psychol 42, 1325–1340 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-014-9875-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-014-9875-8

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