The incapacity to be alone in conduct disordered boys

Research in the area of conduct disorder has recently begun to focus on the context of the conduct disordered (CD) child's aversive behavior as well as the child's internal experience which in part drives this behavior. Based on a review of the literature in the areas of CD, attachment theory, object relations theory, and loneliness, it was proposed that CD children have not developed a capacity to be alone as defined by Winnicott (1965) . Approximately 10 hours of videotape of each of three conduct disordered boys on an inpatient psychiatric unit were analyzed on a 15 second interval basis. As predicted, the subjects were significantly more non-constructive when they were not in direct interaction with another person. The boys were most likely to achieve social interaction after making an appropriate social overture, but when they did not receive social interaction they came out of this solitary experience predisposed to suppress these prosocial behaviors. It appears that solitary time is a negative experience for these children and that it disrupts their fragile sense of connection with others. The findings are interpreted in light of a previous study (Wahler, Castellani, Griffith, & Keathley, 1994) which compared a group of children with conduct problems with normal counterparts and also demonstrated that solitary time was a setting event for increased noncompliance in the clinic-referred children.