Relation of age of onset to the type and severity of child and adolescent conduct problems

In a cross-sectional household sample of 9-through 17-year-old youths from 4 U.S. communities, youths with earlier ages of onset of conduct problems e ngaged in more conduct problems than youths with later ages of onset when c urrent age and gender were controlled. Specifically, youths with earlier ag es of onset were more likely to engage in several types of physical aggress ion, frequent lying, theft, and vandalism and were less likely to engage in only truancy. There also was an inverse relation between age of onset and level of functional impairment, mental health service use, and meeting diag nostic criteria for conduct disorder, attention-deficit hyperactivity disor der, and oppositional defiant disorder. Within the limits of cross-sectiona l data, these results support the hypothesis that key aspects of the hetero geneity of conduct problems among youths are related to the age of onset of conduct problems.