This meta-analysis of 172 studies (N = 2,263 anxious,N = 1,768 nonanxious) examined the boundary conditions of threat-related attentional biases in anxiety. Overall, the results show that the bias is reliably demonstrated with different experimental paradigms and under a variety of experimental conditions, but that it is only an effect size of d = 0.45. Although processes requiring conscious perception of threat contribute to the bias, a significant bias is also observed with stimuli outside awareness. The bias is of comparable magnitude across different types of anxious populations (individuals with different clinical disorders, high-anxious nonclinical individuals, anxious children and adults) and is not observed in nonanxious individuals. Empirical and clinical implications as well as future directions for research are discussed.

Two extant evolutionary models, biological sensitivity to context theory (BSCT) and differential susceptibility theory (DST), converge on the hypothesis that some individuals are more susceptible than others to both negative (risk-promoting) and positive (development-enhancing) environmental conditions. These models contrast with the currently dominant perspective on personal vulnerability and environmental risk: diathesis stress/dual risk. We review challenges to this perspective based on emerging theory and data from the evolutionary, developmental, and health sciences. These challenges signify the need for a paradigm shift in conceptualizing Person x Environment interactions in development. In this context we advance an evolutionary--neurodevelopmental theory, based on DST and BSCT, of the role of neurobiological susceptibility to the environment in regulating environmental effects on adaptation, development, and health. We then outline current thinking about neurogenomic and endophenotypic mechanisms that may underpin neurobiological susceptibility, summarize extant empirical research on differential susceptibility, and evaluate the evolutionary bases and implications of BSCT and DST. Finally, we discuss applied issues including methodological and statistical considerations in conducting differential susceptibility research; issues of ecological, cultural, and racial--ethnic variation in neurobiological susceptibility; and implications of differential susceptibility for designing social programs. We conclude that the differential susceptibility paradigm has far-reaching implications for understanding whether and how much child and adult development responds, for better and for worse, to the gamut of species-typical environmental conditions.

Is early preventive intervention effective in enhancing parental sensitivity and infant attachment security, and if so, what type of intervention is most successful? Seventy studies were traced, producing 88 intervention effects on sensitivity (n = 7,636) and/or attachment (n = 1,503). Randomized interventions appeared rather effective in changing insensitive parenting (d = 0.33) and infant attachment insecurity (d = 0.20). The most effective interventions used a moderate number of sessions and a clear-cut behavioral focus in families with, as well as without, multiple problems. Interventions that were more effective in enhancing parental sensitivity were also more effective in enhancing attachment security, which supports the notion of a causal role of sensitivity in shaping attachment.

Dunng the past 10 years nearly 80 studies on disoigamzed attachment mvolvmg moie than 6 000 mfanl-paient dyads have been cained out The cunent series ot meta-analyscs have estabhshed the lehabihty and disuimmant vahdity of disoigamzed mfant attachment Although disorganized attachment behavioi is necessanly difficult to observe and often subtle, many reseaichers have managed to become rehable codeis Fuitheimoie, disoigamzed attachment shows modest shoit-and long term stabihty, in paiticular in middle class envnonments and it is not just a concomitant of constitutional, temperamental, or physical child pioblems The prediclive vahdity of disorganized attachment is estabhshed in terms of pioblematic strcss management, the elevated nsk of externahzmg problem behavior, and even the tendency of disorganized infants to show dissociative behavioi later in life In noimal middle class families about 15% of the infants develop disorganized attachment behavioi In other social contexts and in chnical groups this percentage may become twice 01 even thiee times highei (e g in the case of maltreatment) Although the importance of disorganized attachment foi developmental psychopathology is evident the seatch foi the mechanisms leading to disoiganization has just started Fiightemng parental behavioi may play an important role but it does not seem to be the only causal factoi mvolved in the emergence of disoigamzed attachment

Our comprehensive meta-analysis combined prevalence figures of childhood sexual abuse (CSA) reported in 217 publications published between 1980 and 2008, including 331 independent samples with a total of 9,911,748 participants. The overall estimated CSA prevalence was 127/1000 in self-report studies and 4/1000 in informant studies. Self-reported CSA was more common among female (180/1000) than among male participants (76/1000). Lowest rates for both girls (113/1000) and boys (41/1000) were found in Asia, and highest rates were found for girls in Australia (215/1000) and for boys in Africa (193/1000). The results of our meta-analysis confirm that CSA is a global problem of considerable extent, but also show that methodological issues drastically influence the self-reported prevalence of CSA.

This study addresses the extent to which insecure and disorganized attachments increase risk for externalizing problems using meta-analysis. From 69 samples (N = 5,947), the association between insecurity and externalizing problems was significant, d = 0.31 (95% CI: 0.23, 0.40). Larger effects were found for boys (d = 0.35), clinical samples (d = 0.49), and from observation-based outcome assessments (d = 0.58). Larger effects were found for attachment assessments other than the Strange Situation. Overall, disorganized children appeared at elevated risk (d = 0.34, 95% CI: 0.18, 0.50), with weaker effects for avoidance (d = 0.12, 95% CI: 0.03, 0.21) and resistance (d = 0.11, 95% CI: -0.04, 0.26). The results are discussed in terms of the potential significance of attachment for mental health.

In this review, we combine and compare the results of a series of meta‐analyses on the prevalence of child sexual, physical and emotional abuse and physical and emotional neglect, including 244 publications and 551 prevalence rates for the various types of maltreatment. Child maltreatment research seems to be dominated by research on sexual abuse, studies in developed parts of the world and research using self‐report measures. The overall estimated prevalence rates for self‐report studies (mainly assessing maltreatment ever during childhood) were 127/1000 for sexual abuse (76/1000 among boys and 180/1000 among girls), 226/1000 for physical abuse, 363/1000 for emotional abuse, 163/1000 for physical neglect and 184/1000 for emotional neglect. The overall estimated prevalence rates for studies using informants (mainly assessing the 1‐year prevalence of maltreatment) were four per 1000 for sexual abuse and three per 1000, respectively, for physical abuse and emotional abuse. We conclude that child maltreatment is a widespread, global phenomenon affecting the lives of millions of children all over the world, which is in sharp contrast with the United Nation's Convention on the Rights of the Child. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Key Practitioner Messages: Child maltreatment research is dominated by research on sexual abuse. The prevalence rates for informant studies were lower than for self‐report studies. The prevalence of child maltreatment is largely similar across the globe.

More than 200 adult attachment representation studies, presenting more than 10,500 Adult Attachment Interview (AAI; George, Kaplan, & Main, 1985) classifications, have been conducted in the past 25 years. In a series of analyses on the distributions of the AAI classifications in various cultural and age groups, fathers, and high-risk and clinical samples, we used the distribution of the combined samples of North American non-clinical mothers (23% dismissing, 58% secure, 19% preoccupied attachment representations, and 18% additionally coded for unresolved loss or other trauma) to examine deviations from this normative pattern, through multinomial tests and analyses of correspondence. The analyses were restricted to AAI classifications coded according to the Main, Goldwyn, and Hesse (2003) system. We did not find gender differences in the use of dismissing versus preoccupied attachment strategies, and the AAI distributions were largely independent of language and country of origin. Clinical subjects showed more insecure and unresolved attachment representations than the norm groups. Disorders with an internalizing dimension (e.g., borderline personality disorders) were associated with more preoccupied and unresolved attachments, whereas disorders with an externalizing dimension (e.g., antisocial personality disorders) displayed more dismissing as well as preoccupied attachments. Depressive symptomatology was associated with insecurity but not with unresolved loss or trauma, whereas adults with abuse experiences or PTSD were mostly unresolved. In order to find more reliable associations with clinical symptoms and disorders, future AAI studies may make more fruitful use of continuous AAI scales in addition to the conventionally used categorical classifications.