We review the three prevailing approaches—specificity, cumulative risk, and dimensional models—to conceptualizing the developmental consequences of early-life adversity and address fundamental problems with the characterization of these frameworks in a recent Perspectives on Psychological Science piece by Smith and Pollak. We respond to concerns raised by Smith and Pollak about dimensional models of early experience and highlight the value of these models for studying the developmental consequences of early-life adversity. Basic dimensions of adversity proposed in existing models include threat/harshness, deprivation, and unpredictability. These models identify core dimensions of early experience that cut across the categorical exposures that have been the focus of specificity and cumulative risk approaches (e.g., abuse, institutional rearing, chronic poverty); delineate aspects of early experience that are likely to influence brain and behavioral development; afford hypotheses about adaptive and maladaptive responses to different dimensions of adversity; and articulate specific mechanisms through which these dimensions exert their influences, conceptualizing experience-driven plasticity within an evolutionary-developmental framework. In doing so, dimensional models advance specific falsifiable hypotheses, grounded in neurodevelopmental and evolutionary principles, that are supported by accumulating evidence and provide fertile ground for empirical studies on early-life adversity.

我们回顾了三种流行的方法——特异性、累积风险和维度模型——来概念化早期生活逆境的发展后果，并在最近的《心理科学展望》中解决这些框架特征的基本问题史密斯和波拉克的作品。我们回应了史密斯和波拉克对早期经历的维度模型提出的担忧，并强调了这些模型对于研究早期逆境的发展后果的价值。现有模型中提出的逆境的基本维度包括威胁/严酷性、剥夺和不可预测性。这些模型确定了早期经验的核心维度，这些维度跨越了作为特异性和累积风险方法（例如，虐待、机构抚养、长期贫困）关注的分类暴露；描述可能影响大脑和行为发展的早期经历的各个方面；提供关于对不同维度逆境的适应性和适应不良反应的假设；并阐明这些维度发挥影响的具体机制，在进化-发展框架内概念化经验驱动的可塑性。在这样做的过程中，维度模型提出了基于神经发育和进化原理的特定可证伪假设，这些假设得到了积累证据的支持，并为早期生活逆境的实证研究提供了肥沃的土壤。