Stress

Despite well-established linkages between stress and adjustment across development, the field of life-stress research in children is still in its infancy. Additional research is needed to address several unanswered questions concerning the role of stress in development and to help guide the design of appropriate interventions. For example, the premise underlying the majority of life-stress research is that exposure to certain environmental demands overwhelms children's coping abilities, thereby precipitating psychological and health-related problems. Nevertheless, this focus on how stress affects children's development is somewhat limited. Instead, Rudolph and Hammen argued in a 1999 article that a more complete understanding of the developmental context of stress requires consideration of not only how children react to external events and circumstances but also how they construct and contribute to their environments. This stress-generation approach highlights the importance of studying characteristics of children that lead them to create stressful conditions, which then interfere further with their development.

Also, researchers have only begun to examine the processes through which stress undermines children's development. Thus, researchers need to learn more about how and why different types of stress create emotional, behavioral, and physical problems in children, as well as why some children are more likely to generate stress in their lives.

A more in-depth understanding about the complex linkages between stress and developmental outcomes is essential for the creation of effective intervention programs. Identifying personal qualities of children or environmental contexts that either exacerbate or dampen the negative effects of stress will provide essential information about how health professionals, teachers, and parents can promote effective coping strategies. Moreover, discovering which types of stress create a risk for particular problems and exploring how these effects occur will facilitate the development of targeted intervention programs that are tailored to the needs of the individual. Finally, identifying which children may be at highest risk for exposure to, or generation of, stress will lay the groundwork for early intervention programs designed to prevent the onset of the complicated cycle linking stressful life experiences and unhealthy development.