Undercontrolled children tended to be emotional and impulsive, whereas inhibited children were timid and especially uneasy around strangers. Well-adjusted children were generally able to control their behavior and were not overly upset by strangers. Every two years since these initial observations, researchers interviewed the children and made further assessments of their behavior. Surprisingly, now that the children are 21, there are still significant differences among the three groups. Many events can happen in a person s life to change his or her personality.
Many children have problems adjusting when their parents decide to divorce.
Though many psychologists believe these adjustment problems may result from disruptions in the children's social and family environment, other researchers indicate that these problems may actually be genetic. The research team found that children whose biological parents divorced before the children were 12 years old were more likely to have behavioral problems, substance abuse problems, difficulties with academic achievement, and trouble with social adjustment than were children whose biological parents did not divorce. The researchers concluded that, because adjustment problems with behavior and substance abuse were no more common among children whose biological parents divorced than among children whose adoptive parents divorced, these problems were probably more related to the disrupted environment than genetics. On the other hand, the researchers note that because the problems with achievement and social competence are more common among children whose biological parents divorced than among children whose adoptive parents divorced, problems with achievement and social adjustment following parental divorce may have a link to the children's genes. However, until recently, no one had been able to find differences between the neuron structure of the left and right hemispheres.