A new study published in Scientific Reports indicates that insecure parental attachment and stunted emotional intelligence are part and parcel of the mechanisms that explain how childhood maltreatment is related to the development of callous-unemotional traits.
Callous-unemotional traits are characterized by the demonstration of a lack of guilt, minimal empathy, and shallow emotions. Studies suggest that early life experiences, particularly persistent neglect and/or persistent physical, emotional, and/or sexual abuse during childhood, is strongly associated with the development of callous-unemotional traits.
However exactly how childhood maltreatment can predict callous-unemotional traits is not well-established.
The research team, led by Jiaxi Peng of Beijing Sport University, firstly speculated about the importance of attachment theory, which describes how the quality of early attachments that infants form with their primary caregiver can have a lasting influence upon emotional and social development. Individuals experiencing maltreatment in their childhood can develop an insecure attachment style, which is characterized by feelings of being unworthy of love as well as a difficulty forming trusting, intimate relationships.
Furthermore, individuals with callous-unemotional traits have been found to have decreased emotional intelligence, otherwise known as the ability to be aware of, understand, and manage one’s emotions.
Consequently, the researchers sought to test the hypothesis that childhood maltreatment would lead to low-quality parental attachments and subsequently low emotional intelligence, and therefore would be significantly associated with callous-unemotional traits.
Studies have demonstrated that higher callous-unemotional traits that were rooted in childhood maltreatment increases the chances of adolescents committing violent crimes, and thus the researchers recruited 429 incarcerated male adolescents aged 14 to 18 from two correctional facilities in China.
The incarcerated adolescents completed four questionnaires: the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire‑Short Form (CTQ‑SF) to measure childhood maltreatment, the Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment to measure attachments to one’s mother and father, the Wong and Law Emotional Intelligence Scale (WLEIS) to measure emotional intelligence and finally the Inventory of Callous‑Unemotional Traits‑Short Form (ICU‑SF) to measure callous‑unemotional traits.
A statistical model was applied to measure the relationship between all the variables that were derived from the questionnaires. A significant relationship between childhood maltreatment and callous-unemotional traits was confirmed. To explain this relationship the researchers proposed that, “during the growth or socialization process, children will imitate the maltreatment imposed on them. Individuals under long-term maltreatment and negligence tend to have intense negative emotions, low self-esteem and suffer isolation, depression, self-humiliation, and fury, which further leads to apathy, a deficit of sympathy, and the development of callous-emotional traits.”
Interestingly, parental attachment and emotional intelligence had a partial role in the relationship between childhood maltreatment and callous-unemotional traits, influencing nearly 39 percent of the relationship. Peng and colleagues suggest, “negative parent–child relationships during early childhood predispose the affected individuals to have negative feelings toward others and the world, to feel that other people are unreliable and unsafe, and that they themselves are unloved. Hence, they may suffer problems, including in hospitality, delayed moral development, aggressiveness, and antisocial behaviors — in short, callous-unemotional traits.”
Some limitations of the study are to be noted. While the incarcerated adolescents were surveyed due to a high presence of callous-unemotional traits in this population, the findings may not be applicable to a general adolescent population. Additionally, as parental attachment and emotional intelligence only influenced part of the association between childhood maltreatment and callous-unemotional traits, there may be other variables not explored that play a role, warranting further investigation.
The study, “Parental attachment and emotional intelligence mediates the effect of childhood maltreatment on callous‑unemotional traits among incarcerated male adolescents”, was authored by Jiaxi Peng, Huijie Lu, Jiaxi Zhang, Weizhuo Yuan, Peng Fang, Jianquan Tian and Lei Wang.