Chunk #15 — Epigenesis: The Developmental Cascade of Risk, Heterogeneity of Developmental Course, and Possible Indirect Genetic Effects on the Disinhibition Pathway
The evidence for heterogeneity in the course of undercontrol as a function of gender differences is equivocal. Although differences in level of undercontrol are virtually universally in the stereotypic direction, gender differentiation in causal structure and relationships with other variables is mixed. Differences have sometimes been found in predictive models involving undercontrolled behavior, but degree of effect often varies with age, sometimes disappearing with increasing age over the course of childhood and adolescence (Hussong et al. 2007), and sometimes increasing (Hicks et al., 2007). In other studies, gender differences have either been completely absent or present only in subsidiary parts of the analysis (e.g., Dodge et al., 2009; Slutske et al., 2002). The diversity of these findings suggests that gender differentiation in level of undercontrol does not assure that the relationships among variables will also be different.
