Recent follow-up studies of VLBW infants have focused on cognitive, sensory, motor, and educational outcome, with relatively little emphasis placed on behavioral and social adjustment outcome. The few studies that have included those outcomes have not explored whether a child's behavior and social adjustment, as reported by the parent, is influenced by the parent's own psychological status. The present study explored the relationships between family stress, maternal anxiety and optimism, and maternal reported child behavior problems in a sample of 8-year-olds who had been born VLBW. Fifty infants born between 1986 and 1988 with BW < 1500 gm., were comprehensively evaluated at 8 years of age. Part of this evaluation included mothers' completing the Parenting Stress Index (Abidin,1990), Life Orientation Test(Scheier & Carver,1985), Social Support Scale (Sherbourne & Stewart,1991), the State-Trait Anxiety Scale (Spielberger et al.,1970), the Life Events Scale (Wiklund et al.,1992), and the Impact On Family Scale(Stein& Riessman,1980). Child behavior and social adjustment outcome was measured by mothers' report on the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL; Achenbach, 1993) and Conners' Parent Rating Scale-Revised (Conners, 1997). Higher scores on the CBCL and Conners' Hyperactivity Index were positively correlated (all p<.05)with scores on measures of parent stress (r=.43 and.32), anxiety(r=.39 and.35), and perceived impact of the child's illness on the family(r=.33 and.29). CBCL scores, but not Conners' scores, were positively correlated with stressful life events (r=.30 and.01), and were negatively correlated with scores on measures of social support (r= -.50 and -.19), and optimism (r= -.44 and -.05; CBCL p values <.05, Conners' p values >.05). Family and maternal variables accounted for 10 to 25% of the variance associated with scores on behavioral and social adjustment measures. It appears that behavioral and social adjustment outcome may be viewed as stemming from an interaction of biologic, family, and maternal variables. Investigators are cautioned to include measures of family and parent stress in their follow-up studies of high-risk infants.