Developmental Trajectories of Basic Psychological Need Frustration in Early and Middle Adolescence and Their Associations with Mental Health

Basic psychological need frustration changes over time and is closely related to adolescent mental health. However, it remains unclear how need frustration changes specifically in early versus middle adolescence and whether it predicts later mental health outcomes. To address these gaps, this three-wave, one-year longitudinal study modeled trajectories of autonomy, relatedness, and competence frustration separately in early and middle adolescents and examined their prediction of depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and life satisfaction one year later, while also testing sex differences in trajectories and predictive links. Participants included 1,282 early adolescents (M age = 12.30, SD age = 0.48; 52.34% girls) and 1,566 middle adolescents (M age = 15.18, SD age = 0.48; 50.76% girls). In early adolescence, autonomy frustration was stable, relatedness frustration increased, and competence frustration decreased. In middle adolescence, autonomy and competence frustration decreased, whereas relatedness frustration was stable. In both periods, the trajectories of all three need frustrations, including initial levels and slopes, positively predicted depressive and anxiety symptoms and negatively predicted life satisfaction one year later. Regarding sex differences, early adolescent girls reported higher initial relatedness and competence frustration than boys. In middle adolescence, the predictive links between initial levels of all three need frustrations and depressive symptoms were stronger for boys, and initial autonomy frustration more strongly predicted anxiety symptoms for boys. These findings suggest that need frustration follows stage-specific trajectories in early and middle adolescence and that these trajectories predict later depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and life satisfaction, with some links stronger for boys than for girls in middle adolescence.