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Daily life mechanisms of stress spillover among early adolescents experiencing academic difficulty

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Abstract

Research has suggested that academic stress may “spillover” into other life domains and have negative psychological or social consequences for children and adolescents outside of school settings, but relatively few investigations have examined mediators and moderators of spillover. The current study explored the mediating role of state affect and the moderating roles of prior academic performance and mood disturbances on spillover in a sample of 131 French adolescents. Participants completed clinical measures of anxiety and depression and participated in a 7-day ambulatory monitoring phase that involved multiple daily assessments of mood, behaviors, and activities. Spillover was observed for family events and subsequent school-related events, as well as between family and leisure events. These associations remained significant when controlling for immediate mood responses, suggesting that state affect does not play a salient mediating role. There was no evidence that spillover was moderated by academic difficulty, anxiety, depression, or gender. Results are discussed in terms of the role that emotional processes may play in spillover phenomena as well as the reciprocal influence that academic and non-academic events may exert each other.

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Authors and Affiliations

Authors

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Correspondence to Joel Swendsen.

Additional information

Reda Salamon. Postdoctoral fellow at the French National Center for Scientific Research, Bordeaux.

Current themes of research:

Behaviors and experiences of children in academic difficulty.

Most relevant publications in the field of Psychology of Education:

Salamon, R., Johnson, I. E., Grondin, O., Swendsen, J. (2009). Etude des problèmes comportementaux et émotionnels chez l’adolescent: faisabilité et validité de l’approche ESM. Journal de Thérapie Comportementale et Cognitive, 19, 41–46.

Elizabeth I. Johnson. Assistant Professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

Current themes of research:

Child welfare issues. Parental incarceration. Ambulatory monitoring.

Most relevant publications in the field of Psychology of Education:

Johnson, E. I., & Waldfogel, J. (2004). Children of incarcerated parents: Multiple risk and children’s living arrangements. In M. Pattillo, D. Weiman, & B. Western (Eds.), Imprisoning America: The social effects of mass incarceration (pp. 97–131). New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

Johnson, E. I., (2006). Youth with incarcerated parents: An introduction to the issues. The Prevention Researcher, 13, 3–7.

Berger, L., Bruch, S. K., Johnson, E. I., James, S., & Rubin, D. (2009). Estimating the “impact” of out-of-home placement on child well-being: Approaching the problem of selection bias. Child Development, 80, 1856–1876.

Johnson, E. I., Grondin, O., Barrault, M., Faytout, M., Helbig, S., Husky, M., Granholm, E. L., Loh, C., Nadeau, L., Wittchen, H. U., Swendsen, J. (2009). Computerized ambulatory monitoring in psychiatry: a multi-site collaborative study of acceptability, compliance, and reactivity. International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research, 18, 48–57.

Joel Swendsen. Director of Research at the French National Center for Scientific Research, Bordeaux. E-mail: Joel.Swendsen@u-bordeaux2.fr

Current themes of research:

Psychiatric epidemiology. Computerized ambulatory monitoring.

Most relevant publications in the field of Psychology of Education:

Merikangas, K. R., He, J. P., Burstein, M., Swanson, S. A., Avenevoli, S., Cui, L., Benjet, C., Georgiades, K., Swendsen, J. (2010). Lifetime prevalence of mental disorders in U.S. adolescents: results from the National Comorbidity Survey Replication--Adolescent Supplement (NCS-A) J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry, 49, 975–976.

Swendsen, J., Conway, K. P., Degenhardt, L., Dierker, L., Glantz, M., Jin, R., Merikangas, K. R., Sampson, N., Kessler, R. C. (2009). Sociodemographic risk factors for alcohol and drug dependence: The 10-year follow-up of the national comorbidity survey. Addiction, 104, 1346–1355.

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Salamon, R., Johnson, E.I. & Swendsen, J. Daily life mechanisms of stress spillover among early adolescents experiencing academic difficulty. Eur J Psychol Educ 26, 453–463 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10212-011-0056-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10212-011-0056-7

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