Callous-Unemotional Traits in Adolescents' Daily Life: Associations with Affect and Emotional and Conduct Problems

Natalie Goulter, Eric M. Cooke, Yao Zheng

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

6 Citations (Scopus)
51 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Intensive longitudinal methods (e.g., daily diary) inform understanding of dynamic processes by parsing within-person state-like fluctuations from stable between-person trait-like differences. In this exploratory study, we investigated whether self-reported callous-unemotional (CU) traits (callousness, uncaring) demonstrated daily fluctuations, as well as whether daily CU traits were associated with multiple forms of daily emotional and behavioral functioning. A sample of 99 adolescents (55.8% female; M age = 14.60 years) provided baseline information and completed a naturalistic 30-day diary reporting on CU traits, positive and negative affect, and emotional and conduct problems in their daily lives. Dynamic structural equation modeling revealed that many CU traits items showed within-person autoregressive and cross-lagged links; however, there was substantial between-person variation in within-person fluctuations across items. At the subscale level, cross-day associations were observed between callousness and uncaring, conduct problems and uncaring, positive affect and callousness, negative affect and emotional problems, and emotional problems and negative affect. By harnessing intensive longitudinal data, our findings provide preliminary state-level evidence of CU traits, as well as functional information with regards to CU traits and emotional and behavioral problems in daily life. We consider the implications of our findings in terms of informing future CU traits intensive longitudinal evaluations.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)51-63
Number of pages13
JournalResearch on Child and Adolescent Psychopathology
Volume52
Issue number1
Early online date30 May 2023
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jan 2024
Externally publishedYes

Keywords

  • Adolescence
  • Affect
  • Callous-unemotional traits
  • Conduct problems
  • Emotional problems
  • Intensive longitudinal data

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Callous-Unemotional Traits in Adolescents' Daily Life: Associations with Affect and Emotional and Conduct Problems'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this