Etiology of Stability and Growth of Internalizing and Externalizing Behavior Problems Across Childhood and Adolescence

Internalizing and externalizing behaviors are heritable, and show genetic stability during childhood and adolescence. Less work has explored how genes influence individual differences in developmental trajectories. We estimated ACE biometrical latent growth curve models for the Teacher Report Form (TRF) and parent Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) internalizing and externalizing scales from ages 7 to 16 years in 408 twin pairs from the Colorado Longitudinal Twin Study. We found that Intercept factors were highly heritable for both internalizing and externalizing behaviors (a2 = .61–.92), with small and nonsignificant environmental influences for teacher-rated data but significant nonshared environmental influences for parent-rated data. There was some evidence of heritability of decline in internalizing behavior (Slopes for teacher and parent ratings), but the Slope genetic variance was almost entirely shared with that for the Intercept when different than zero. These results suggest that genetic effects on these developmental trajectories operate primarily on initial levels and stability, with no significant unique genetic influences for change. Finally, cross-rater analyses of the growth factor scores revealed moderate to large genetic and environmental associations between growth factors derived from parents' and teachers' ratings, particularly the Intercepts.