Editorial: Integrative perspectives on the person-context interplay through the lens of temperament

Temperament is accorded a prominent role in psychology as the biologically-based mechanism by which individuals contribute to their own learning and development, distinct from, but related to, higher-order personality traits involving specific thoughts, values, and conceptions of self, others, and the world (e.g., Henderson and Wachs, 2007). Certain dispositional traits confer vulnerability to adverse outcomes, in part by influencing the “goodness-of-fit” between the individual and the surroundings. The role of temperament in the “fit” is complex, involving multiple interrelated layers in the person-context dynamic. Cascade models of development posit that early appearing risk factors are magnified over time because processes that shape children's functioning in one domain progressively influence functioning in other domains (Masten and Cicchetti, 2010). Accordingly, temperamental tendencies that increase risk for maladaptive transactions with the surroundings not only undermine goodness-of-fit in the moment, but may also disrupt longer term wellbeing. Temperament plays a role in shaping both overt transactions with the environment and the self-organizing processes of learning from experience, which eventuate in understandings that inform subsequent transactions (e.g., Verron and Teglasi, 2018).In addressing various aspects of the person-context interplay, the studies in this Research Topic contribute to its overall aim of promoting integrative perspectives on goodness-of-fit as involving three layers of transaction between person and context. The person-in-context layer involves moment-to-moment transactions between the individual and the surroundings. Person-as-context encompasses self-organizing processes within the individual, including the interplay of multiple temperamental traits and the cognitive/affective processes that jointly shape what is learned. The assumptions and understandings gained from prior self-organizing processes function as pre-conceptions that influence current responses, referring to person-of-prior-context.</p

On the lattice structure of probability spaces in quantum mechanics

Let C be the set of all possible quantum states. We study the convex subsets of C with attention focused on the lattice theoretical structure of these convex subsets and, as a result, find a framework capable of unifying several aspects of quantum mechanics, including entanglement and Jaynes' Max-Ent principle. We also encounter links with entanglement witnesses, which leads to a new separability criteria expressed in lattice language. We also provide an extension of a separability criteria based on convex polytopes to the infinite dimensional case and show that it reveals interesting facets concerning the geometrical structure of the convex subsets. It is seen that the above mentioned framework is also capable of generalization to any statistical theory via the so-called convex operational models' approach. In particular, we show how to extend the geometrical structure underlying entanglement to any statistical model, an extension which may be useful for studying correlations in different generalizations of quantum mechanics.Comment: arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1008.416

Research Review: Do parent ratings of infant negative emotionality and self‐regulation predict psychopathology in childhood and adolescence? A systematic review and meta‐analysis of prospective longitudinal studies

Background Identifying low‐cost and easy to implement measures of infant markers of later psychopathology may improve targeting of early intervention for prevention. Because of their early manifestation, relative stability and overlap with constructs central to affect‐based dimensions of child and adolescent psychopathology, negative emotionality and self‐regulation have been the focus of this research. We conducted a meta‐analysis of longitudinal studies examining the prospective association between infant temperament measured with parent ratings and child/adolescent psychopathology. Methods A systematic literature search for prospective longitudinal studies, which included measures of questionnaire‐assessed infant temperament (negative emotionality, self‐regulation, behavioural inhibition, surgency/extraversion, activity level) and symptoms of child or adolescent mental health (externalising, internalising) and neurodevelopmental problems (attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder [ADHD], autism spectrum disorder [ASD]), was conducted. Standardised estimates of association were calculated and pooled in meta‐analyses. Results Twenty‐five studies (n = 28,425) met inclusion criteria. Small associations were seen between psychopathology aggregated across all domains and infant negative emotionality (r = .15; p < .001) and self‐regulation (r = −.19; p = .007). Effects were also significant but weaker for behavioural inhibition (r = .10; p = .027) and activity level (r = .08; p = .016). Surgency/extraversion was not significantly associated with psychopathology in general (r = −.04; p = .094); however, it was negatively associated with ASD (r = −.10, p = .015). Significant correlations were observed with some outcomes isomorphic with predictors, internalising problems and behavioural inhibition (r = .10; p = .013), ADHD symptoms and activity level (r = .19; p = .009). Conclusion Questionnaire‐based assessments of infant negative emotionality may have transdiagnostic potential to contribute to a risk index of later childhood psychopathology. Behavioural inhibition, surgency/extraversion and activity ratings may provide more specific predictive power. More data from prospective studies are required before the potential of self‐regulation and surgency/extraversion can be properly gauged