Background: International literature has underlined the complex interplay between genetic and environmental variables in shaping children's emotional-behavioral functioning. Objective: This study aimed to explore the dynamic relationship between children's Dopamine Transporter (DAT1) genotype and methylation, and maternal and paternal affective…

Individual differences in emotional reactivity emerge early in development and predict important child outcomes. Unfortunately, methods used to assess these often fail to tap dynamic changes in emotion, obscuring nuanced relationships between maladaptive emotional reactivity and early internalizing psychopathology. We therefore explored the…

A growing body of literature indicates that children with Specific Learning Disorder (SpLD) are at risk of internalising and externalising problems. Instead, less is known about the factors that may influence this symptomatology. For instance, a few studies investigated the extent to which impaired school well-being could predict internalising and…

Social anhedonia, a tendency toward experiencing social stimuli as less positive or pleasurable, is associated with maladaptive personality traits, poor interpersonal functioning, and psychopathology, and is typically elevated in males compared with females. However, the correlates of social anhedonia in youth have not been well defined. In this…

When meeting someone at zero acquaintance, we make assumptions about each other that encompass emotional states, personality traits, and even cognitive abilities. Evidence suggests individuals can accurately detect psychopathic personality traits in strangers based on short video clips or photographs of faces. We present an in-depth examination of…

The quality of early parent-child relationship affects children's later emotional development, social competence and school performance (Caputi, Lecce, & Pagnin, 2017). Moreover, the perception of a warm relationship with parents supports the use of adaptive social skills and approach-oriented coping strategies (Chan, 2011). Children…

Introduction: Intellectual disability (ID) is characterized by limitations in cognitive and adaptive functioning. The aim of this study is to examine sociodemographic characteristics, perinatal and childhood risk factors, and prevalence of psychiatric and biomedical comorbidities in children with ID. Methods: 260 patients with ID were included in…

The association between creativity and psychopathology has, for decades, been a focus of heated debate fuelled by contradictory findings. Nevertheless, the findings suggest complex associations between creativity and psychopathology. Other studies have investigated the association between creativity and sex, with inconsistent results. The aim of…

This study examined the contribution of executive functioning (EF) to improvements in psychiatric symptomatology following I Can Succeed (ICS; Kopelman-Rubin, 2012) psychotherapy, a skill-enhancement intervention designed to target EF and socio-emotional aspects of specific learning disabilities (SLD). Forty adolescents with SLD underwent ICS in…

Background: Social (pragmatic) communication disorder (SPCD) is a new diagnosis introduced by DSM-5, characterised by problems with verbal and nonverbal social communication. It is currently unclear whether SPCD is a valid diagnostic category, because little is known about the characteristics of those who meet its criteria. We sought to identify…

Postnatal maternal depression is associated with poorer child emotional and behavioral functioning, but it is unclear whether this occurs following brief episodes or only with persistent depression. Little research has examined the relation between postnatal anxiety and child outcomes. The present study examined the role of postnatal major…

The Hellenic WISC-III (Wechsler, 1997) is currently the only standardized and officially published tool for the assessment of the intelligence of children and adolescents in Greece. The test is also used with caution in Cyprus, among Greek speakers, but no specific norms exist for use in this country. The purpose of this study was to provide…

Efforts to identify biological correlates of internalizing symptoms in childhood have involved examinations of HPA-axis functioning, namely Cortisol Awakening Response (CAR). However, research has not assessed the relationship between CAR and internalizing problems among children younger than 8 years. Findings with older samples have been somewhat…

Clinicians routinely administer Hare's (2003) Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) to sex offenders and report PCL-R scores as meaningful predictors of recidivism risk. Although a 2005 meta-analysis reported a small (d = 0.29) association between PCL-R scores and sexual recidivism (Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2005), no meta-analysis has examined…

Background: Confounding introduced by gene-environment correlation (rGE) may prevent one from observing a true gene-environment interaction (G × E) effect on psychopathology. The present study investigated the interacting effect of the BDNF Val66Met polymorphism and stressful life events (SLEs) on adolescent depression while controlling for the…