Cognitive Vulnerabilities, Negative Life Events, and Depressive Symptoms in Young Adolescents
Section snippets
Dysfunctional attitudes
Dysfunctional attitudes (Beck, 1967, Clark & Beck, 1999, Kovacs & Beck, 1978) include cognitive distortions that guide an individual's self-evaluation and lead to an individual's creating overly negative appraisals of the self, world, and future. These attitudes can be held regarding achievement (e.g., “If I don't make the varsity team, I'm a failure as a person.”), interpersonal factors (e.g., “I'm nobody if I don't have friends.”), and intrapersonal factors (e.g., “I'm nobody unless I'm
Negative inferential style
Negative inferential style is a cognitive vulnerability that includes three types of negative inferences individuals make when confronted with a negative life event: (a) inferences about the cause of the event (e.g., “I failed my math test because I am stupid.”), (b) inferences about the consequences of the event (e.g., “I'll never pass another math test.”), and (c) inferences about characteristics of the self, given the occurrence of the event (e.g., “I'm a failure because I failed my math
Ruminative response style
Ruminative response style refers to a way of thinking in which individuals direct their attention to their negative emotional state but fail to take any type of action to relieve their symptoms or improve their situation (Nolen-Hoeksema, 1991, Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 2008). For example, an adolescent male who uses a ruminative response style after experiencing a negative event such as not getting a role in a school play, would repetitively think about his audition and wish it had gone better
Design and Sample
A cross-sectional, descriptive correlational design was used to investigate cognitive vulnerabilities, negative life events, and depressive symptoms. A minimum sample size (N = 100) was determined based on power analysis with an effect size of 0.3, a power of 0.80, and an alpha level of .05. An effect size of .3 represents approximately 9% shared variability and is accepted as a minimal meaningful standard for psychosocial research. A convenience sample (N = 111) of healthy seventh- and
Results
The sample with complete data consisted of 63 females (57%) and 48 males (43%), ranging in age from 12 to 15 years. Most were Caucasian (93%), which was representative of the schools from which the potential participants were recruited (Tennessee Department of Education, 2010). In this sample, approximately 81% of the parents/legal guardians reported a high school education/GED or higher. Using the updated occupations in the BSMSS (Barratt, 2006) and Hollingshead's Two Factor Index of Social
Discussion
This study is one of the first to examine all three cognitive vulnerabilities (i.e., dysfunctional attitudes, negative inferential style, and ruminative response style) with negative life events and depressive symptoms in a sample of young adolescents. The high percentage of variance in depressive symptoms explained by the full regression model and the unique contribution of ruminative response style provide strong support for the role that cognitive vulnerabilities have in the development of
Conclusion
This study contributes to the research evidence that cognitive vulnerabilities (i.e., dysfunctional attitudes, negative inferential style, and ruminative response style) are associated with depressive symptoms in a community-based sample of young adolescents. The results also strongly support the importance of ruminative response style in the development of depressive symptoms in this population. To prevent the persistence of depressive symptoms in adolescents, increased interdisciplinary
References (63)
- et al.
Dysfunctional attitudes as a cognitive vulnerability factor for depression in children of affectively-ill parents: A multi-wave longitudinal study
Behaviour Research and Therapy
(2007) - et al.
Minor depression: Risk profiles, functional disability, health care use and risk of developing major depression
Journal of Affective Disorders
(2004) - et al.
The effects of rumination and negative cognitive styles on depression: A mediation analysis
Behavior Research and Therapy
(2008) - et al.
Lifetime prevalence of mental disorders in U.S. adolescents: Results from the National Comorbidity Survey Replication–Adolescent Supplement (NCS-A)
Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
(2010) - et al.
Psychosocial risks for major depression in late adolescence: A longitudinal community study
Journal of American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
(1993) - et al.
Epidemiology of depressive symptoms in the national longitudinal study of adolescent health
Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
(2002) - et al.
The role of stressful life events in the development of depressive symptoms in adolescence—A longitudinal community study
Journal of Adolescence
(2004) - et al.
Dysfunctional attitudes and the common mental disorders in primary care
Journal of Affective Disorders
(2003) The hopelessness theory of depression: A test of the diathesis–stress and causal mediation components in third and seventh grade children
Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology
(2001)- et al.
An examination of the response styles theory of depression in third- and seventh grade children: A short term longitudinal study
Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology
(2002)
The hopelessness theory of depression: A test of the diathesis–stress component in the interpersonal and achievement domains
Cognitive Therapy and Research
Cognitive vulnerability–stress models of depression in a self-regulatory and psychobiological context
Hopelessness depression: A theory-based subtype of depression
Psychological Review
Rural poverty, urban poverty, and psychological well-being
The Sociological Quarterly
Psychometric properties of scales for the measurement of psychosocial variables associated with depression in adolescence
Psychological Reports
Depression: Clinical, experimental, and theoretical aspects
Early adolescent gender differences in the use of ruminative and distracting coping strategies
Journal of Early Adolescents
Dimensions of dysfunctional attitudes as vulnerabilities to depressive symptoms
Journal of Abnormal Psychology
Depressive symptoms and health risk among rural adolescents
Pediatrics
Subtypes of rumination in adolescence: Associations between brooding, reflection, depressive symptoms, and coping
Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology
Modeling relations between hassles and internalizing and externalizing symptoms in adolescents: A four-year prospective study
Journal of Abnormal Psychology
Scientific foundations of cognitive theory and therapy of depression
Economic stress, coercive family process, and developmental problems of adolescents
Child Development
Assessment of depression in childhood and adolescence: An evaluation of the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale for Children (CES-DC)
American Journal of Psychiatry
Screening for depressive disorders in children and adolescents: Validating the center for epidemiologic studies depression scale for children
American Journal of Epidemiology
Subthreshold depression in adolescence and mental health outcomes in adulthood
Archives of General Psychiatry
Mental health, educational, and social role outcomes of adolescent with depression
Archives of General Psychiatry
Consequences and correlates of adolescent depression
Archives of Pediatric Adolescent Medicine
Stress exposure and stress generation in adolescent depression
Cited by (26)
Maternal cognitions and cognitive, behavior and emotional development in middle childhood
2023, Current Research in Behavioral SciencesThe developmental origins of ruminative response style: An integrative review
2019, Clinical Psychology ReviewCitation Excerpt :Uncontrollable or chronic stressors may be more likely to induce rumination because the discrepancies they create are often difficult to resolve (Watkins, 2008). Several studies have found that stressful life events are associated with rumination in children and adolescents (Waasdorp, Bagdi, & Bradshaw, 2010; Young, LaMontagne, Dietrich, & Wells, 2012). Evidence from experience-sampling studies also suggests a relation between daily stressful events and momentary ruminative self-focus.
Brooding rumination as a mediator in the relation between early maladaptive schemas and symptoms of depression and social anxiety in adolescents
2014, Journal of AdolescenceCitation Excerpt :The Response Style Theory proposes the ruminative response style as a cognitive vulnerability factor for the development of depression and anxiety (McLaughlin & Nolen-Hoeksema, 2011; Nolen-Hoeksema, 1991). People who tend to ruminate as a response to depressive or anxious symptomatology are at higher risk of increasing or maintaining such symptomatology over time than people who seek distraction or solve the problem, as shown by diverse studies in adults (for a review, see Aldao & Nolen-Hoeksema, 2010; Aldao, Nolen-Hoeksema, & Schweizer, 2010; Nolen-Hoeksema, Wisco, & Lyubomirsky, 2008; Thomsen, 2006) and adolescents (McLaughlin & Nolen-Hoeksema, 2011; Muris, Fokke, & Kwik, 2009; Muris, Roelofs, Meesters, & Boomsma, 2004; Roelofs et al., 2009; Young, LaMontagne, Dietrich, & Wells, 2012; for a review, see Abela & Hankin, 2010; Rood, Roelofs, Bögels, Nolen-Hoeksema, & Schouten, 2009). Concerning social anxiety, the results of several studies have also shown that this type of disorder is consistently associated with high levels of rumination among adults and youth when faced with social events (Hofmann, 2007; Jose, Wilkins, & Spendelow, 2012; Kashdan & Roberts, 2007; Kocovski, Mackenzie, & Rector, 2011; Perini, Abbott, & Rapee, 2006; Wong & Moulds, 2010).
Patterns of life stress and the development of ruminative brooding in adolescence: A person-centered approach
2023, Development and PsychopathologyGenetic and environmental etiologies of adolescent dysfunctional attitudes: A twin study
2014, Twin Research and Human Genetics