Can developmental changes in inhibition and peer relationships explain why depressive symptoms increase in early adolescence?

Alexithymia as a mediator of the associations between child maltreatment and internalizing and externalizing behaviors in adolescence

Child maltreatment is a global concern that profoundly affects individuals throughout their lives. This study investigated the relationships between various forms of child maltreatment and behavior problems involving internalization and externalization during adolescence. Data obtained from a diverse sample of 1802 Canadians aged 14-18 years was used to examine the mediating role of alexithymia-a difficulty in recognizing and expressing emotions-in these associations. Results indicated that adolescents who experienced sexual abuse, emotional abuse, and exposure to intimate partner violence (IPV) in their childhood exhibited higher levels of alexithymia, which was correlated with elevated levels of both internalizing and externalizing problems. Physical abuse and parental neglect were only associated with externalizing problems. Gender differences also emerged, with gender-diverse adolescents reporting a higher prevalence of maltreatment, alexithymia, and behavior problems compared with their peers. However, alexithymia's mediating role was consistent across genders. Overall, this study highlights the intricate relationships between child maltreatment, alexithymia, and adolescent behavior problems. The findings of this study how different forms of child maltreatment significantly shape behavioral outcomes and indicate the importance of interventions in enhancing emotional awareness and expression in adolescents with a childhood history of maltreatment.

Racial/ethnic differences in parenting behaviors as protective factors in adolescent internalizing problems

The current study explores variations among racially/ethnically diverse adolescents regarding parents' role in mitigating internalizing problems. Adolescents with a higher level of parental awareness, ease of talking to parents, and parental support were less likely to show internalizing problems. Parental awareness was negatively associated with internalizing problems among Whites and Hispanics. The ease of talking to parents was significant for all groups except for American Indians/Alaska Natives. These findings can inform culturally relevant treatments.

Continuity of psychopathology v. resilience across the transition to adolescence: role of hair cortisol and sensitive caregiving

BACKGROUND

The transition to adolescence implicates heightened vulnerability alongside increased opportunities for resilience. Contexts of early life stress (ELS) exacerbate risk; still, little research addressed biobehavioral mediators of risk and resilience across the adolescent transition following ELS. Utilizing a unique cohort, we tested biosocial moderators of chronicity in adolescents' internalizing disorders v. resilience.

METHOD

Families exposed to chronic war-related trauma, v. controls, were followed. We utilized data from three time-points framing the adolescent transition: late childhood (N = 177, Mage = 9.3 years ± 1.41), early adolescence (N = 111, Mage = 11 0.66 years ± 1.23), and late adolescence (N = 138, Mage = 15.65 years ± 1.31). In late childhood and late adolescence children's internalizing disorders were diagnosed. At early adolescence maternal and child's hair cortisol concentrations (HCC), maternal sensitivity, and mothers' post-traumatic symptoms evaluated.

RESULTS

War-exposed children exhibited more internalizing disorders of chronic trajectory and mothers were less sensitive and more symptomatic. Three pathways elucidated the continuity of psychopathology: (a) maternal sensitivity moderated the risk of chronic psychopathology, (b) maternal post-traumatic symptoms mediated continuity of risk, (c) trauma exposure moderated the association between child internalizing disorders at late childhood and maternal HCC, which linked with child HCC. Child HCC linked with maternal post-traumatic symptoms, which were associated with child disorders in late adolescence.

CONCLUSION

Results demonstrate the complex interplay of maternal and child's biosocial factors as mediators and moderators of risk chronicity across the adolescent transition following trauma. Findings are first to utilize maternal and child's HCC as biomarkers of chronic stress v. resilience during adolescence, a period of neural reorganization and personal growth that shapes the individual's lifetime adaptation.

Effects of Smartphone Overdependence and the Quality of Friendship on Depression among High School Students

This study analyzes the effects of smartphone overdependence and the quality of friendship on depression among high school students in Korea. The study subjects were 121 high school students. Smartphone overdependence was assessed using the smartphone overdependence scale for adolescents, depression was assessed using the Korean version of the patient health questionnaire-9, and the quality of friendship was assessed using the friendship quality questionnaire. The results of the correlation analysis showed statistically significant differences among all the variables. The results of the multiple linear regression analysis showed that smartphone overdependence increases the depression level, whereas the quality of friendship lowers it. To decrease depression among high school students, smartphone overdependence and the quality of friendship should be managed appropriately. Moreover, the causal relationships and mediating effects between smartphone overdependence and the quality of friendship should be analyzed.

The developmental cascade of early parenting, emergence of executive functioning, and emotional symptoms across childhood

Many studies focus on proximal associations between parental sensitivity and emotional well-being in early childhood, with less data examining how parenting in infancy predicts children's emotional trajectories across childhood, in particular negative emotional symptoms of anxiety and depression. Thus, this study utilized data from The Family Life Project (N = 1015), a prospective study of child development in rural poverty, and assessed whether sensitive parenting in the first 4 years of life predicted child internalizing emotional symptoms (i.e., anxiety and depression) from kindergarten to fifth grade and whether early child executive functioning mediated this relationship. Path models indicated that observation of sensitive parenting predicted a decrease in teachers' report of child negative emotional symptoms over time and predicted fewer negative emotional symptoms in fifth grade. Moreover, though executive functioning performance did not mediate change in symptoms over time, executive functioning did mediate the relationship between sensitive parenting and fifth-grade symptoms, suggesting that executive functioning is one mechanism by which early sensitive parenting buffers long-term emotional development. Findings highlight the importance of early parenting and executive functioning in development of anxiety and depression symptoms and suggests potential targets for transdiagnostic intervention.

Sleep quality, insomnia, and internalizing difficulties in adolescents: insights from a twin study

Study Objectives

There is a well-established association between poor sleep quality and internalizing traits. This relationship has previously been studied using a twin design. However, when it comes to adolescence, there is a paucity of twin studies that have investigated this relationship, despite the importance of this developmental stage for both the development of poor sleep quality and internalizing symptoms. Additionally, anxiety sensitivity, which is commonly associated with poor sleep quality, has not been studied in this context. Our objective was to estimate genetic and environmental influences on the relationships between insomnia, poor sleep quality, and internalizing symptoms in adolescence.

Methods

Insomnia, poor sleep quality, depression, anxiety, and anxiety sensitivity traits were measured in a sample of 5111 twin pairs from the Twins Early Development Study, born between 1994 and 1996 (mean age 16.32 years [SD = 0.68]).

Results

A moderate proportion of the variance for the different variables (.29–.42) was explained by genetic factors. Associations between sleep and internalizing variables were moderate (r = .34–.46) and there was a large genetic overlap between these variables (rA= .51–.73).

Conclusion

This study adds novel information by showing that there are large genetic correlations between sleep disturbances and internalizing symptoms in adolescence.

Sleep, Affect, and Social Competence from Preschool to Preadolescence: Distinct Pathways to Emotional and Social Adjustment for Boys and for Girls

Using a normative sample of 1,057 children studied across 4 waves over 6 years with multiple informants, we investigated transactional relations for sleep problems, anxious-depressed symptoms, and social functioning from preschool to preadolescence, assessing cumulative effects on children's emotional and social adjustment. To examine sex differences in the developmental processes, we conducted separate analyses for boys and girls. For both boys and girls, longitudinal cross-lagged panel analyses showed that preschool sleep problems directly predicted anxious-depressed symptoms 2 years later; indirect effects continued into preadolescence. For girls, early and later sleep problems directly or indirectly predicted a wide variety of preadolescent emotional and social adjustment domains (e.g., depressive symptoms, school competence, emotion regulation, risk-taking behaviors). For boys, social competence played a more important role than sleep problems in predicting preadolescent adjustment. Among the first set of findings that demonstrate longitudinal relations between sleep problems and social functioning in middle childhood and preadolescence, these results support Dahl's and Walker's neurological models of sleep and emotional functioning. We discuss these findings in light of relations between sleep and affect during pre-pubertal development and discuss differential findings for boys and girls.

Dimensions of Maternal Parenting and Infants' Autonomic Functioning Interactively Predict Early Internalizing Behavior Problems

Developmental pathways to childhood internalizing behavior problems are complex, with both environmental and child-level factors contributing to their emergence. The authors use data from a prospective longitudinal study (n = 206) to examine the associations between dimensions of caregiving experiences in the first year of life and anxious/depressed and withdrawn behaviors in early childhood. Additionally, the authors examine the extent to which these associations were moderated by infants' autonomic functioning in the first year of life indexed using measures of respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) and heart period (HP). Findings suggest that higher levels of maternal sensitivity in infancy are associated with fewer anxious/depressed and withdrawn behaviors at age 3 years. Negative intrusiveness was found to be positively associated with children's anxious/depressed behaviors but not withdrawn behaviors. Further, moderation analyses suggested that the link between negative intrusive parenting during infancy and subsequent anxious/depressed behaviors is exacerbated for infants with average or low baseline HP and that positive engaging parenting during infancy was negatively related to withdrawn behaviors for infants demonstrating average to high levels baseline HP. Interestingly, RSA was not found to moderate the associations between parenting in infancy and later internalizing behavior problems suggesting that, during infancy, overall autonomic functioning may have greater implications for the development of internalizing behaviors than do parasympathetic influences alone. Implications of these findings and future directions for research are discussed.

Interpersonal stressors in the schoolyard and depressive symptoms among Chinese adolescents: The mediating roles of rumination and co-rumination

Stressors have been identified as significant vulnerability factors in the development of adolescents’ depression. The present study focused on the relationship between depressive symptoms and two types of interpersonal stressors in the schoolyard, namely teacher-student interaction stressors (TSIS) and peer interaction stressors (PIS). More importantly, rumination and co-rumination were examined as two possible mechanisms to account for these relationships. A convenience sample of 570 Chinese adolescents aged from 12- to 19-years-old participated in this research. Results indicated that TSIS and PIS were significantly related to participants’ depressive symptoms. Furthermore, rumination partially mediated the relationship between PIS and depressive symptoms. Co-rumination was a partial mediator between both types of interpersonal stressors and depressive symptoms. Hence, rumination and co-rumination might serve as two mechanisms linking interpersonal stressors in the schoolyard and depressive mood in adolescence. The findings are discussed in the light of related literature and potential implications for school practitioners.

Developmental trajectories of anxious and depressive problems during the transition from childhood to adolescence: personality × parenting interactions

This study examined separate developmental trajectories of anxious and depressive symptoms from childhood to adolescence (9-15 years) in a community-based sample (N = 290). At three measurement points, mothers and fathers reported on their children's anxious and depressive symptoms, and at Time 1 they reported on lower order child personality facets and on their parenting. By means of growth mixture modeling, three developmental trajectories were identified for anxious symptoms: steady low (82%), moderate increasing-decreasing (5.9%), and high declining groups (12.1%). For depressive symptoms, two developmental trajectories were found: steady low (94.1%) and moderate increasing groups (5.9%). Higher shyness, irritability, and altruism predicted membership in more problematic anxious and depressive groups. The personality facets energy, optimism, compliance, and anxiety were unique predictors for class membership for anxious symptoms, and the effects of shyness, irritability, and compliance were moderated by overreactive parenting. Shyness and irritability increased the probability of following the moderate increasing-decreasing anxiety trajectory, but only in the context of high or average levels of overreactive parenting. Compliance increased the probability of following the moderate increasing-decreasing and high decreasing trajectories in the context of high overreactive parenting. Our results indicate that childhood personality facets differentiate trajectories of anxious and depressive symptoms in theoretically compelling ways.

Modification effects of family economic status and school factors on depression risk of single-father family children in Mid-Taiwan area

The incidence of single-parent families has increased significantly in Taiwan in recent years. Children born in single-parent families are predisposed to suffering from emotional problems. We aimed to determine if the children of single-parent families are more depressive than children from both-parent families, and to examine the individual and joint effects of various factors on the depression risk. A cross-sectional study was performed to investigate the depression status of elementary school children in MiaoLi County, Taiwan. A total of 881 eligible subjects, including 144 children from single-parent families were recruited from 29 schools. Data for depression-related demographic characteristics, family and school variables were collected. The results show that 27.6% of children from single-father families with depressive symptoms, 15.1% children from single-mother families and 15.3% children from both-parent families with repressive symptoms. This study provides significant evidences that single-father family was one significant predictor for childhood depression and the enhanced effects of socioeconomic status and peer relationship on depression of children from single father families were found up to 4-fold (OR=4.0, 95% CI=1.8-8.5) and 5-fold (OR=5.5, 95% CI=2.3-13.2) risk respectively. The results provide hints to parents and teachers for improving the mental health of children in single-parent families by reducing the occurrence of depression.