The relation of prosocial behavior to the development of aggression and psychopathology.

The development of prosocial behavior is traced from middle childhood to adulthood in a 22-year longitudinal study of 800 children first seen at age 8 and is compared to the development of aggression over the same period. Prosocial behavior and aggression seem to represent opposite ends of a single dimension of behavior since they are consistently negatively related to each other and relate in opposite ways to correlated variables both synchronously and over time. Both are stable forms of behavior with good predictability over the time span studied and both are related to the quality of the parent-child relationship. The most important deterrent to the development of antisocial behavior and the encouragement of prosocial behavior is probably a close identification between the child and hidher parents.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/83382/1/1984.Eron&Huesmann.RelatofProsocBehavtotheDevelofAggn&Psychopath.AggBehav.pd

Outcomes of Childhood Aggression in Women

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/75752/1/j.1749-6632.1996.tb32553.x.pd

Intellectual functioning and aggression

In a 22-year study, data were collected on aggressiveness and intellectual functioning in more than 600 subjects, their parents, and their children. Both aggression and intellectual functioning are reasonably stable in a subject's lifetime and perpetuate themselves across generations and within marriage pairs. Aggression in childhood was shown to interfere with the development of intellectual functioning and to be predictive of poorer intellectual achievement as an adult. Early 1Q was related to early subject aggression but did not predict changes in aggression after age 8. On the other hand, differences between early IQ and intellectual achievement in middle adulthood were predictable from early aggressive behavior. A dual-process model was offered to explain the relation between intellectual functioning and aggressive behavior. We hypothesized that low intelligence makes the learning of aggressive responses more likely at an early age, and this aggressive behavior makes continued intellectual development more difficult.The research described here was supported by Grant MH-34410 to Leonard D. Eron and MH-38683 to L. Rowell Huesmann from the National Institute of Mental Health.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/83384/1/1987.Huesmann_etal.IntellectualFuncning&Aggr.JourofPersonality&SociPsych.pd

Mitigating the imitation of aggressive behaviors by changing children's attitudes about media violence.

A sample of 169 first- and third-grade children, selected because of their high exposure to television violence, was randomly divided into an experimental and a control group. Over the course of 2 years, the experimental subjects were exposed to two treatments designed to reduce the likelihood of their imitating the aggressive behaviors they observed on TV. The control group received comparable neutral treatments. By the end of the second year, the experimental subjects were rated as significantly less aggressive by their peers, and the relation between violence viewing and aggressiveness was diminished in the experimental group.This research was supported in part by grants MH-28280 and MH-31886 from the National Institute of Mental Health.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/83377/1/1983.Huesmann_etal.MitigatingtheImitatofAggressBehavbyChangingChildren's.JourofPersonality&SocialPsych.pd

Measuring children’s aggression with teachers’ predictions of peer-nominations.

Peer nominations have been used very successfully to assess aggressive dispositions in children but are costly to administer in situations in which a subject population is scattered among many classrooms. In the present study, the authors evaluated an alternative measure, the Teacher Prediction of Peer-Nominated Aggression. This measure proved to be highly reliable and valid—a better predictor of peer nominations of aggression than teacher checklist ratings of aggression. The teachers' predictions of peer-nominated aggression also displayed the same pattern of interrelations and gender differences as actual peer nominations of aggression. Finally, the teachers' predictions of aggression were more accurate than their predictions of other behaviors.This research has been supported by grants from the National Institute of Mental Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/83416/1/1994.Huesmann_etal.MeasuringChildren'sAggwithTeachers'Predictionsof Peer-nom.PsychAssess.pd

Brief but Efficient: Acute HIV Infection and the Sexual Transmission of HIV

Background. We examined whether viral dynamics in the genital tract during the natural history of acute human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) infection could explain efficient heterosexual transmission of HIV. Methods. We measured HIV-1 concentration in blood and semen samples from patients with acute and long-term HIV-1 infection. We explored the effect of changes in viral dynamics in semen on the probability of transmission per coital act, using a probabilistic model published elsewhere. Results. Considered over time from infection, semen HIV-1 concentrations, in men with acute infection, increase and decrease in approximate parallel with changes occurring in blood. Modeling suggests that these acute dynamics alone are sufficient to increase probability of heterosexual transmission by 8-10-fold between peak (day 20 after infection, based on the model) and virologic set points (day 54 and later after infection). Depending on the frequency of coitus, men with average semen HIV-1 loads and without sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) would be expected to infect 7%-24% of susceptible female sex partners during the first 2 months of infection. The predicted infection rate would be much higher when either partner has an STD. Conclusions. Empirical biological data strongly support the hypothesis that sexual transmission by acutely infected individuals has a disproportionate effect on the spread of HIV-1 infection. Acute hyperinfectiousness may, in part, explain the current pandemic in heterosexual individual

Stressful events and individual beliefs as correlates of economic disadvantage and aggression among urban children.

This study examined 3 factors that were hypothesized to increase risk for aggression among urban children: economic disadvantage, stressful events, and individual beliefs. Participants were 1,935 African American, Hispanic, and White elementary-school boys and girls assessed over a 2-year period. The relation between individual poverty and aggression was only significant for the White children, with significant interactions between individual and community poverty for the other 2 ethnic groups. With a linear structural model to predict aggression from the stress and beliefs variables, individual poverty predicted stress for African American children and predicted beliefs supporting aggression for Hispanic children. For all ethnic groups, both stress and beliefs contributed significantly to the synchronous prediction of aggression, and for the Hispanic children, the longitudinal predictions were also significant. The findings are discussed in terms of their implications for preventive interventions in multiethnic, inner-city communities.The research was supported by Grant MH-48034 from the National Institute of Mental Health and Cooperative Agreement CCU510017 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/83500/1/1995.Guerra_etal.StressfulEvents&IndiBeliefsasCorrelatesofEconDisadvantage&AggAmongUrbChildrn.JourofCnsulting&ClinPsych.pd

Interval dosing with the HDAC inhibitor vorinostat effectively reverses HIV latency

BACKGROUND. The histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitor vorinostat (VOR) can increase HIV RNA expression in vivo within resting CD4+ T cells of aviremic HIV+ individuals. However, while studies of VOR or other HDAC inhibitors have reported reversal of latency, none has demonstrated clearance of latent infection. We sought to identify the optimal dosing of VOR for effective serial reversal of HIV latency

Normative Influences on Aggression in Urban Elementary School Classrooms

We report a study aimed at understanding the effects of classroom normative influences on individual aggressive behavior, using samples of 614 and 427 urban elementary school children. Participants were assessed with measures of aggressive behavior and normative beliefs about aggression. We tested hypotheses related to the effects of personal normative beliefs, descriptive classroom norms (the central tendency of classmates' aggressive behavior), injunctive classroom normative beliefs (classmates' beliefs about the acceptability of aggression), and norm salience (student and teacher sanctions against aggression) on longitudinal changes in aggressive behavior and beliefs. Injunctive norms affected individual normative beliefs and aggression, but descriptive norms had no effect on either. In classrooms where students and teachers made norms against aggression salient, aggressive behavior diminished over time. Implications for classroom behavior management and further research are discussed.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/44053/1/10464_2004_Article_223769.pd