Behaviour Problems and Language Abilities at Three Years and Behavioural Deviance at Eight Years

A representative sample of 535 children were followed up from their third to their eighth birthday using measures of language ability and behaviour. At age 8 yr it was found that there were significantly more boys with behavioural deviance than girls, and that children from manual social class backgrounds also showed more behavioural deviance. The only difference between the immigrant and non-immigrant children was a less frequent occurrence of neurotic deviance in the immigrant group. It was found that behaviour problems at age 3 yr were strongly related to behavioural deviance at school at age 8 yr, particularly for boys. This medium-term stability in behaviour problems had not been found in previous studies looking at younger children. A low score on a measure of language structure at age 3 yr was found to be related to a high rate of neurotic deviance at age 8 yr even when behaviour at age 3 yr was controlled. The implications of these findings for the early identification and intervention with children at risk for later behaviour deviance are discussed.