INEFFECTIVE PARENTING AND CHILDHOOD CONDUCT PROBLEMS - THE MODERATINGROLE OF CALLOUS-UNEMOTIONAL TRAITS

A sample of 6- to 13-year-old clinic-referred (n = 136) and volunteer (n = 30) participants was investigated for a potential interaction bet ween the quality of parenting that a child receives and callous-unemot ional traits in the child for predicting conduct problems. Ineffective parenting was associated with conduct problems only in children witho ut significant levels of callous (e.g., lack of empathy, manipulativen ess) and unemotional (e.g., lack of guilt, emotional constrictedness) traits. In contrast, children high on these traits exhibited a signifi cant number of conduct problems, regardless of the quality of parentin g they experienced. Results are interpreted in the context of a model that proposes that callous-unemotional traits designate a group of chi ldren with conduct problems who have distinct causal factors involved in the development of their problematic behavior.