TY - JOUR T1 - Examining the potential link between child maltreatment and callous-unemotional traits in children and adolescents: A multilevel analysis. AU - Joyner,Bridget, AU - Beaver,Kevin M, Y1 - 2021/09/15/ PY - 2021/05/17/received PY - 2021/08/05/revised PY - 2021/09/06/accepted PY - 2021/9/18/pubmed PY - 2022/3/19/medline PY - 2021/9/17/entrez KW - Callous-unemotional traits KW - Child maltreatment KW - Multilevel analysis KW - Psychopathic personality traits SP - 105327 EP - 105327 JF - Child abuse & neglect JO - Child Abuse Negl VL - 122 N2 - BACKGROUND: There is a great deal of research indicating that callous-unemotional traits in childhood are among the strongest predictors of adult psychopathy and psychopathic traits. As a result, there has been a recent surge of studies examining potential risk factors that may be related to the development of callous-unemotional traits. OBJECTIVE: The current study sought to extend prior research examining potential risk factors for the development of callous-unemotional traits by estimating the extent to which child maltreatment related to callous-unemotional traits in children and adolescents. PARTICIPANTS: To do so, the study uses a longitudinal sample of 4579 male and female youths drawn from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being (NSCAW I) across four waves of data. Data collection ran from November 1999 to December 2006. METHODS: A series of multilevel random-effects models were estimated in order to examine the association between child maltreatment and callous-unemotional traits. RESULTS: The results of the analyses revealed a significant association between child maltreatment and callous-unemotional traits across all the models. Additionally, our models demonstrated that the association between child maltreatment and callous-unemotional traits may be dependent upon the biological sex of the individual with child maltreatment having a stronger effect on males than females (β = 0.15*). CONCLUSIONS: Overall, our analyses lend support to prior research examining child maltreatment as a risk factor for the development of callous-unemotional traits in youth. We conclude by discussing the implications of our study and considerations for future research. SN - 1873-7757 UR - https://www.unboundmedicine.com/medline/citation/34534846/Examining_the_potential_link_between_child_maltreatment_and_callous_unemotional_traits_in_children_and_adolescents:_A_multilevel_analysis_ DB - PRIME DP - Unbound Medicine ER -