Risks that are associated with some probability of a deviant developmental course, or trajectory; risks (e.g., very preterm birth) with outcomes (e.g., cerebral palsy) later in a child’s development. More fully, developmental risk can be defined as an event (e.g., chromosomal disorder), circumstance (e.g., severe intrauterine growth restriction) or property (e.g., neurological disturbance) about which it is known that there is a statistically increased chance of a sometimes much later appearing problem or disturbance occurring in the development of a child through diverting the child’s developmental trajectory (or growth) from a course typically followed by most healthy children. Developmental risk research, first arising to prominence in the 1960s, assumes a number of forms: 1. ‘Outcomes specified’ (e.g. risk for a specific disease), where the question is “What are the predisposing factors?”, 2. ‘Risk factor specified’ (e.g., prematurity) that addresses the question “What are the discrete outcomes?”, and 3. ‘Disorders specified’ where the question of interest is “What are the variations in outcome?”.
See Biological risk factor, Cerebral palsy, Developmental trajectories, Risk factors, Risk mechanisms, Sleeper effect, Social risk factor, Very (or extremely) preterm birth