Background Few studies have considered the long-term psychosocial outcomes of individuals with histories of early childhood speech sound disorders (SSD). Research on long-term psychosocial outcomes of individuals with language impairment (LI) have frequently failed to consider the effects of co-morbid SSD. The purpose of this study was to compare individuals with histories of SSD with versus without LI on these outcomes and to examine the contributions of other comorbid conditions including reading disorders (RD) and ADHD. Methods Participants were adolescents aged 11–17 years (N = 129) and young adults aged 18–33 years (N =98). Probands with SSD were originally recruited between 4 and 6 years of age and classified into SSD-only and SSD+LI groups. Siblings of these children were also assessed at this time and those without SSD or LI were followed as controls. Outcome measures at adolescence and adulthood included ratings of hyperactivity, inattention, anxiety, and depression, as well as internalizing, externalizing, social, and thought problems. Adult outcomes also included educational and employment status and quality of life ratings. Regression modeling was performed to examine the association of SSD, LI, RD, and ADHD with psychosocial outcomes using Generalized Estimating Equations. Results In the adolescent group, LI was associated with poorer ratings of psychosocial problems on all scales except depression. Histories of SSD-only, RD and ADHD did not independently predict any of the adolescent psychosocial measures. In contrast, LI in the adult sample was not significantly associated with any of the behavior ratings, though RD was related to higher ratings of hyperactivity and inattention and with higher parent ratings of internalizing and externalizing symptoms and thought problems. SSD did not predict any of the adult measures once other comorbid conditions were taken into account. Conclusions Poor adolescent psychosocial outcomes for individuals with early childhood SSD were primarily related to comorbid LI and not to SSD per se. At adulthood comorbid RD and ADHD may influence outcomes more significantly than LI.

Recent research has highlighted the potential role of attention bias for emotional stimuli as a possible cognitive risk factor for depression in youth. However, differences in youth emotion regulation or maternal affect may moderate the association between maternal and youth depression and youth attention biases. The current study investigated the relationship between maternal and youth depressive symptoms and youth (aged 11-17 years) attention bias for sad and happy faces in 59 mother-youth dyads, examining whether positive and negative maternal affect observed during structured interaction tasks or youth emotion regulation tendencies moderated associations between maternal and youth depression and attention biases. Youth suppression interacted with maternal and youth depression to predict sad attentional biases in youth, while maternal positive affect interacted with maternal depression to predict happy attention biases in youth.

Binge drinking and depression are highly prevalent, associated with cognitive and affective impairments, and frequently co-occur. Yet little research has examined their joint relations with such processing impairment. The current study examines the relation between symptoms of depression, binge drinking, and the magnitude of early (early posterior negativity, EPN) and later (P3 and late positive potential, LPP) visual processing components of affectively negative, positive, and neutral visual stimuli. Participants included 42 undergraduate students recruited on the basis of depressive symptoms. Results of repeated measures analyses of variance (ANOVAs; Depression × Binge × Emotion × Laterality) showed that binge drinkers exhibited lower LPP amplitudes for negative images, compared with nonbinge drinkers, regardless of depression, consistent with motivational models of alcohol abuse. Otherwise, differences across depressed and nondepressed groups were largest among binge drinkers, including a pattern of stronger early attentional engagement (EPN) to negative and neutral images, but decreased later processing (P3 and LPP) across all emotional categories, consistent with a vigilance-avoidance response pattern.

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Mother–child interactions can be emotionally charged, particularly when mothers experience difficulties with depression. Further, variation in the tone of such interactions has been linked to variation in youth functioning. Yet, little is known about the role of emotion regulatory processes during mother–child interactions. This study examined negative affective transactions between mothers and youth across 5-min conflict and fun-activity planning discussions, in relation to depressive symptoms and maternal and youth respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA). Maternal depressive symptoms predicted more negative affect. Maternal and youth RSA interacted with maternal depressive symptoms to predict both overall affect and the stability of affect across time. The beneficial effects of youth RSA were stronger, but maternal RSA weaker, in the face of elevated maternal depression.