Anti-social behaviour
Anti-social behaviours, sometimes called dissocial behaviours, are actions which are considered to violate the rights of or otherwise harm others by committing crime or nuisance, such as stealing and physical attack or noncriminal behaviours such as lying and manipulation. It is considered to be disruptive to others in society. This can be carried out in various ways, which includes, but is not limited to, intentional aggression, as well as covert and overt hostility. Anti-social behaviour also develops through social interaction within the family and community. It continuously affects a child's temperament, cognitive ability and their involvement with negative peers, dramatically affecting children's cooperative problem-solving skills. Many people also label behaviour which is deemed contrary to prevailing norms for social conduct as anti-social behaviour. However, researchers have stated that it is a difficult term to define, particularly in the United Kingdom where many acts fall into its category. The term is especially used in Irish English and British English.
Although the term is fairly new to the common lexicon, the word anti-social behaviour has been used for many years in the psychosocial world where it was defined as "unwanted behaviour as the result of personality disorder." For example, David Farrington, a British criminologist and forensic psychologist, stated that teenagers can exhibit anti-social behaviour by engaging in various amounts of wrongdoings such as stealing, vandalism, sexual promiscuity, excessive smoking, heavy drinking, confrontations with parents, and gambling. In children, conduct disorders could result from ineffective parenting. Anti-social behaviour is typically associated with other behavioural and developmental issues such as hyperactivity, depression, learning disabilities, and impulsivity. Alongside these issues one can be predisposed or more inclined to develop such behaviour due to one's genetics, neurobiological and environmental stressors in the prenatal stage of one's life, through the early childhood years.
The American Psychiatric Association, in its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, diagnoses persistent anti-social behaviour starting from a young age as antisocial personality disorder. Genetic factors include abnormalities in the prefrontal cortex of the brain while neurobiological risk include maternal drug use during pregnancy, birth complications, low birth weight, prenatal brain damage, traumatic head injury, and chronic illness. The World Health Organization includes it in the International Classification of Diseases as dissocial personality disorder. A pattern of persistent anti-social behaviours can also be present in children and adolescents diagnosed with conduct problems, including conduct disorder or oppositional defiant disorder under the DSM-5. It has been suggested that individuals with intellectual disabilities have higher tendencies to display anti-social behaviours, but this may be related to social deprivation and mental health problems. More research is required on this topic.
Development
Intent and discrimination may determine both pro-social and anti-social behaviour. Infants may act in seemingly anti-social ways and yet be generally accepted as too young to know the difference before the age of four or five. Berger states that parents should teach their children that "emotions need to be regulated, not depressed". One problem with the assumption that a behaviour that is "simply ignorant" in infants would have antisocial causes in persons older than four or five years at the same time as the latter are supposed to have more complex brains is that it presumes that what appears to be the same behaviour would have fewer possible causes in a more complex brain than in a less complex brain, which is criticized because a more complex brain increases the number of possible causes of what looks like the same behaviour as opposed to decreasing it.Studies have shown that in children between ages 13–14 who bully or show aggressive behaviour towards others exhibit anti-social behaviours in their early adulthood. There are strong statistical relationships that show this significant association between childhood aggressiveness and anti-social behaviours. Analyses saw that 20% of these children who exhibit anti-social behaviours at later ages had court appearances and police contact as a result of their behaviour.
Many of the studies regarding the media's influence on anti-social behaviour have been deemed inconclusive. Some reviews have found strong correlations between aggression and the viewing of violent media, while others find little evidence to support their case. The only unanimously accepted truth regarding anti-social behaviour is that parental guidance carries an undoubtedly strong influence; providing children with brief negative evaluations of violent characters helps to reduce violent effects in the individual.
Cause and effects
Family
Families greatly impact the causation of anti-social behaviour. Some other familial causes are parent history of anti-social behaviours, parental alcohol and drug abuse, unstable home life, absence of good parenting, physical abuse, parental instability and economic distress within the family.Neurobiology
Studies have found that there is a link between antisocial behaviour and increased amygdala activity specifically centered around facial expressions that are based in anger. This research focuses on the fact that the symptom of over reactivity to perceived threats that comes with antisocial behaviour may be from this increase in amygdala activity. This focus on perceived threat does not include emotions centered around distress.Consumption patterns
There is a small link between antisocial personality characteristics in adulthood and more TV watching as a child. The risk of early adulthood criminal conviction increased by nearly 30 percent with each hour children spent watching TV on an average weekend. Peers can also impact one's predisposition to anti-social behaviours, in particular, children in peer groups are more likely to associate with anti-social behaviours if present within their peer group. Especially within youth, patterns of lying, cheating and disruptive behaviours found in young children are early signs of anti-social behaviour. Adults must intervene if they notice their children providing these behaviours. Early detection is best in the preschool years and middle school years in best hopes of interrupting the trajectory of these negative patterns. These patterns in children can lead to conduct disorder, a disorder that allows children to rebel against atypical age-appropriate norms. Moreover, these offences can lead to oppositional defiant disorder, which allows children to be defiant against adults and create vindictive behaviours and patterns. Furthermore, children who exhibit anti-social behaviour also are more prone to alcoholism in adulthood.Intervention and treatment
As a high prevalence mental health problem in children, many interventions and treatments are developed to prevent anti-social behaviours and to help reinforce pro-social behaviours.Several factors are considered as direct or indirect causes of developing anti-social behaviour in children. Addressing these factors is necessary to develop a reliable and effective intervention or treatment. Children's perinatal risk, temperament, intelligence, nutrition level, and interaction with parents or caregivers can influence their behaviours. As for parents or caregivers, their personality traits, behaviours, socioeconomic status, social network, and living environment can also affect children's development of anti-social behaviour.
An individual's age at intervention is a strong predictor of the effectiveness of a given treatment. The specific kinds of anti-social behaviours exhibited, as well as the magnitude of those behaviours also impact how effective a treatment is for an individual. Behavioural parent training is more effective to preschool or elementary school-aged children, and cognitive behavioural therapy has higher effectiveness for adolescents. Moreover, early intervention of anti-social behaviour is relatively more promising. For preschool children, family is the main consideration for the context of intervention and treatment. The interaction between children and parents or caregivers, parenting skills, social support, and socioeconomic status would be the factors. For school-aged children, the school context also needs to be considered. The collaboration amongst parents, teachers, and school psychologists is usually recommended to help children develop the ability of resolving conflicts, managing their anger, developing positive interactions with other students, and learning pro-social behaviours within both home and school settings.
Moreover, the training for parents or caregivers are also important. Their children would be more likely to learn positive social behaviours and reduce inappropriate behaviours if they become good role models and have effective parenting skills.
Cognitive behavioural therapy
, is a highly effective, evidence-based therapy, in relation to anti-social behaviour. This type of treatment focuses on enabling the patients to create an accurate image of the self, allowing the individuals to find the trigger of their harmful actions and changing how individuals think and act in social situations. Due to their impulsivity, their inability to form trusting relationships and their nature of blaming others when a situation arises, individuals with particularly aggressive anti-social behaviours tend to have maladaptive social cognitions, including hostile attribution bias, which lead to negative behavioural outcomes. CBT has been found to be more effective for older children and less effective for younger children. Problem-solving skills training is a type of CBT that aims to recognize and correct how an individual thinks and consequently behaves in social environments. This training provides steps to assist people in obtaining the skill to be able to evaluate potential solutions to problems occurring outside of therapy and learn how to create positive solutions to avoid physical aggression and resolve conflict.Therapists, when providing CBT intervention to individuals with anti-social behaviour, should first assess the level of the risk of the behaviour in order to establish a plan on the duration and intensity of the intervention. Moreover, therapists should support and motivate individuals to practice the new skills and behaviours in environments and contexts where the conflicts would naturally occur to observe the effects of CBT.