Self-evaluation and depression in adolescents with a chronic illness: A systematic review

Pediatric suicide: Review of a preventable tragedy

Concepts of suicide are explored in this issue with a focus on suicide in children and adolescents. The epidemiology of pediatric suicide in the United States is reviewed; also, risk and protective factors, as well as prevention strategies, are discussed. Suicide in the pediatric athlete and the potential protective effect of exercise are examined. In addition, this analysis addresses the beneficial role of psychological management as well as current research on pharmacologic treatment and brain stimulation procedures as part of comprehensive pediatric suicide prevention. Though death by suicide in pediatric persons has been and remains a tragic phenomenon, there is much that clinicians, other healthcare professionals, and society itself can accomplish in the prevention of pediatric suicide as well as the management of suicidality in our children and adolescents.

Neuropsychological performances, quality of life, and psychological issues in pediatric onset multiple sclerosis: a narrative review

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is primarily a disease diagnosed in young and middle-aged adults. Although MS is a rare condition in pediatric age, an increasing rate of patients is diagnosed under the age of 18. The disabling nature of the disease cannot be reduced only to physical symptoms. Several additional symptoms such as cognitive impairment, fatigue, and psychological symptoms are common features of pediatric MS. The reviewed literature suggests that, despite the lower physical disability, children and adolescents diagnosed with MS are vulnerable to cognitive impairment even in the early stage of the disease. The neuropsychological profile of pediatric MS may resemble that of adult MS, including an impairment in attention/information processing speed, learning, verbal, and visuospatial memory. However, cognitive difficulties in children and adolescents are more likely to involve also general intelligence and linguistic abilities, presumably due to patients' younger age and cognitive growth stage. Cognitive difficulties, beyond physical disability and relapses, may have a considerable impact on learning and school achievement. Depression and fatigue are other highly prevalent disturbances in pediatric MS and may contribute to patients' low functional outcomes. Overall, these manifestations may cause considerable functional impairment on daily activities and quality of life that may require individualized rehabilitative treatment and extensive psychosocial care. Additional neuropsychological research evaluating larger samples, using more homogenous methods, and exploring the role of MS treatment on cognitive and psychological development is required.

The relationship between self-consciousness and depression in college students: the chain mediating effect of meaning life and self-efficacy, with the moderating effect of social support

BACKGROUND

This study aimed to investigate the impact of self-consciousness on depression of college students, and mainly focus on confirming the mediator role of life meaningful and self-efficacy, as well as the moderator role of social support.

METHODS

In the present study, convenient sampling method was adopted, 583 college students were recruited from Harbin city and Wenzhou city in China. All students were assessed using self-assessment scales, including self-consciousness scale, life meaningful scale, self-efficacy scale, social support scale, and self-rating depression scale. Descriptive statistical analysis and correlation analysis, structural equation model analysis were conducted by SPSS 25.0 and M-plus.

RESULTS

Results showed that self-consciousness was negatively related to depression, life meaningful and self-efficacy partially mediated the relation between self-consciousness and depression. Moderated mediation analysis further indicated that the relation between self-efficacy and depression were moderated bu social support. Compare with college students who had high social support, depression in those with low social support was more susceptible to the effect of self-efficacy.

CONCLUSION

These findings imply that college students with low levels of self-consciousness are more easy to be depressive, enhancing their sense of life meaning and self-efficacy can effectively alleviate depression, and college student with high social support can benefit more from self-efficacy. Therefore we should pay more attention to the mental health problems of low levels self-consciousness college students in university.

Personal and family factors for emotional distress in adolescents with chronic disease

Introduction

Physical and psychological comorbidity is a challenge for public health, especially in the adolescent stage due to the difficulties of this age. The salutogenic perspective emphasizes general psychological resources such as self-esteem but also highlights the role of contextual factors such as family members in promoting health. From this perspective, the objective of this study was to analyze the joint influence of demographic factors (sex, age and type of chronic disease), personal factors (self-esteem and perception of threat of the disease) and family factors (affection and communication, psychological and behavioral control) of risk of emotional distress (anxiety-depressive symptoms) in chronically ill adolescents.

Methods

The study is a cross-sectional design with 495 adolescents with chronic disease aged 12-16 years. In order to obtain the results, a linear methodology was used to compare means and perform regressions to predict belonging to the anxiety and depression typologies. Four typologies were constructed: typology I (high anxiety and depression scores); typology II (high anxiety and low depression scores); typology III (low anxiety and high depression scores) and typology IV (low anxiety and depression scores).

Results

The results were consistent with the salutugenic theory. Potential mediating or moderating roles of age, sex, self-esteem, perceived threat and psychological and behavioral control marked the differences between the typologies.

Discussion

This population could benefit from interventions focused on family flexibility.

Self-concept in Adolescents with Physical-Mental Comorbidity

Objective

Little is known about self-concept in adolescents with physical-mental comorbidity. This study investigated whether physical-mental comorbidity was associated with self-concept in adolescents and examined if adolescent age or sex moderated the association between physical-mental comorbidity and self-concept.

Methods

Study data were obtained from the Multimorbidity in Youth across the Life-course (MY LIFE), an ongoing Canadian study of adolescents with chronic physical illness who were recruited from outpatient clinics at a pediatric hospital. A total of 116 adolescents aged ≥ 10 years provided self-reports on key measures.

Results

Adolescents with comorbidity (n = 48) had lower self-concept scores on the Self-Determination Questionnaire (SDQ; d = 0.62) and Self-Perception Profile for Children (SPPC; d = 0.53) vs. adolescents without comorbidity (n = 68). An age × comorbidity status interaction was found and age-stratified models were computed to investigate this moderating effect of age. Amongst older adolescents, comorbidity was associated with lower SDQ (B = -2.55, p < .001), but this association was not found among younger adolescents (B = -0.29, p = .680). A similar effect was found for SPPC among older (B = -0.48, p = .001) and younger adolescents (B = 0.03, p = .842). Adolescent sex was not found to be a moderator.

Conclusions

Physical-mental comorbidity in adolescence was associated with lower self-concept and this association was moderated by age-differences between adolescents with vs. without comorbidity were greater for older adolescents and were clinically relevant. Opportunities to support positive self-perceptions for adolescents with comorbidity are warranted, especially when planning the transition from pediatric to adult health services.