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In “Developmental Risk Factors of Childhood Psychopathology,” Hector Bird reported on a study of a nonclinical sample of Puerto Rican children, ages 4-16 who were screened for psychopathology. Those who scored positive on the child behavior checklist, as well as 20% of those who scored negative, were then evaluated by child psychiatrists in order to learn whether the presence of psychopathology in the children correlated with such factors as delayed language or motor development, prolonged stranger anxiety, prolonged separation anxiety, irritable temperament, difficult weaning or toilet training, stressful life events in the family during the previous year, family dysfunction, separations in early childhood, coercive punishment, or parental negative feelings prior to the child's birth.
Child psychopathology was found to be strongly associated with negative maternal feelings and coercive (including physical) punishment. A history of irritable personality in infancy, and delay in language development also correlated significantly with psychopathology, but no correlation was demonstrated for early separations. Dr. Bird suggested that perhaps it could not be demonstrated in this sample, because association of rare events require a larger sample size. He explained also that the correlations that were demonstrated do not prove causality, but serve only as a first step in the search for causes of psychopathology.
Richard N. Atkins was unable to attend the meeting. His discussion, which was read by Lillian Robinson, focused primarily on the data about conduct