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Conduct Disorder

  • Chapter
Handbook of Developmental Psychopathology

Abstract

Studying conduct disorder is a bit like studying cardiovascular disease. Both constructs represent a loose collection of correlated symptoms, with subtypes, in contrast to a singular disease process. Both heart disease and conduct disorder are vaguely defined constructs with questionable validity, but both disorders have clearly identifiable referent points, such as a myocardial infarction or an act of homicide. In much of medical research, the goal is to identify a cluster of symptoms (called a “syndrome”) and then to seek a single causal agent. This picture characterizes the history of research on acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS). The symptoms were first noted and labeled as a syndrome in the late 1970s, and then the causal agent was identified in the form of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). At that point, the presence of the virus (rather than the syndrome or symptoms) became the operational definition of the disease.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Child and Family Policy, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina, 27708, USA

    Kenneth A. Dodge

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  1. Kenneth A. Dodge
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA

    Arnold J. Sameroff

  2. Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA

    Michael Lewis

  3. Fox Chase Cancer Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

    Suzanne M. Miller

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Dodge, K.A. (2000). Conduct Disorder. In: Sameroff, A.J., Lewis, M., Miller, S.M. (eds) Handbook of Developmental Psychopathology. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-4163-9_24

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