Self-efficacy in 18-month-old toddlers of depressed and nondepressed mothers

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Abstract

Low self-efficacy is a key component of depression. Toddlers of depressed mothers may be at risk for impaired development of self-efficacy because of maternal modeling, diminished encouragement of toddlers' efforts, and/or biological contributions. We examined emerging self-efficacy in 70 toddlers of depressed mothers and 62 toddlers of nondepressed mothers. Depressed mothers had sought treatment and were diagnosed using a structured psychiatric interview. Toddlers were observed while working on a variety of mastery tasks, and an index of self-efficacy was constructed from behavior and affect. As expected, findings indicated that toddlers of depressed mothers showed less self-efficacy. Furthermore, more recent exposure to depression was associated with lower self-efficacy. These findings extend downward in age prior work indicating lower self-efficacy in children of depressed mothers. Early impairment in self-efficacy may place children at risk for later depression and thus may be one pathway for the intergenerational transmission of depression.

Introduction

Bandura (1997) defined self-efficacy as confidence in one's ability to organize and execute the actions needed to accomplish one's goals. This definition emphasizes beliefs and metacognitions that emerge in middle childhood; consequently, work on self-efficacy has focused on older children and adults. Nonetheless, in Bandura's model, affect plays a central role in linking metacognitions to behavior. Furthermore, Bandura describes positive affect, such as pride and personal satisfaction, as a central component of the experience of self-efficacy and, conversely, negative emotions, such as despondency and apathy, as central components of the experience of low self-efficacy. Low self-efficacy is associated with depression, anxiety, and reduced efforts at coping with problems in life.

A rudimentary sense of self-agency can be inferred from behavior and affect emerging early in life. Clearly, pleasure in producing effects begins in infancy; and motivation to master the environment can also be seen very early. A rudimentary sense of self-efficacy emerges as understanding of the self-as-agent and self-as-object develops Jennings, 1991, Jennings, 1993. Toddlers' increasing understanding of goals and outcomes contribute further to the development of self-efficacy Bullock & Lutkenhaus, 1988, Heckhausen, 1982. For toddlers, self-efficacy can be inferred from persistent, self-directed attempts to master a task that are accompanied by positive affect and by pride when successful. As this description implies, the construct of self-efficacy is multidimensional and includes motivation, affect, and self-evaluation. Although the term mastery motivation has often been used to refer to infants' and toddlers' behaviors and affect while working on mastery tasks, we prefer the term self-efficacy because it conceptually links behavior in early life to later behavior across the life span and because it emphasizes the importance of the self in the construct. Furthermore, the term mastery motivation implies a focus solely on the motivational component although recent theoretical work on mastery motivation has emphasized the multifaceted nature of the construct, with both an instrumental component (persistence/motivation) and an expressive component (mastery pleasure/affect; Barrett & Morgan, 1995, Morgan et al., 1995). Beginning in toddlerhood, it is also necessary to include self-evaluation in the experience of affect as affect based on self-evaluation becomes integrated with motivation in the processes underlying mastery behaviors Bullock & Lutkenhaus, 1988, Heckhausen, 1982, Jennings, 1993.

Low self-efficacy, including low persistence, low expectations of success, and feelings of shame rather than pride, plays a central role in cognitive–motivational theories of depression, for example, the learned-helplessness model and selective attention models Abramson et al., 1988, Abramson et al., 1978, Bandura, 1997, Beck, 1967, Peterson & Seligman, 1984. Research based on these theories has documented lower self-efficacy and other negative cognitions and motivation in depressed adults, depressed children, and in children of depressed mothers (e.g., Bandura, 1997, Barnett & Gotlib, 1988, Blumberg & Izard, 1985, Guskin et al., 1991, Hammen, 1988, Kaslow et al., 1988, Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1991, Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1992, Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1995, Pyszczynski & Greenberg, 1987, Weiss et al., 1993).

Children of depressed mothers are at higher risk for depression later in life, and they show impairment in a variety of areas compared to children of nondepressed mothers Birmaher et al., 1996, Cummings & Davies, 1994, Downey & Coyne, 1990, Gelfand & Teti, 1990, Goodman & Gotlib, 1999. Among toddlers, exposure to maternal depression has been associated with problems in several emerging developmental skills, including empathy and self-knowledge Cicchetti et al., 1997, Murray, 1992, Radke-Yarrow et al., 1994. In general, the lifetime risk of depression for children with a depressed parent has been estimated at 45% (Hammen, Burge, Burney, & Adrian, 1990).

One pathway for the intergenerational transmission of depression may be through problems in the development of children's self-efficacy when mothers are depressed. Many theorists have speculated that early impairment in self-efficacy may predispose the child to depression later in life Chorpita & Barlow, 1998, Cicchetti & Aber, 1986, Goodman & Gotlib, 1999, Rose & Abramson, 1992, Rutter & Quinton, 1984. Toddlerhood has long been considered a crucial period for the development of autonomy, feelings of competence, and self-concept Erikson, 1950, Kagan, 1981. Several theorists have suggested that maternal depression should have the most enduring effects on the developmental skills that are emerging at the time of exposure to depression Cicchetti & Toth, 1998, Dawson et al., 1994. This would suggest that autonomy and self-efficacy may be adversely affected by exposure to depression during toddlerhood. Preliminary support for this possibility is provided by a small nonclinical study; toddlers of mothers with more depressive symptoms showed less persistence and less mastery pleasure than other toddlers (Redding, Harmon, & Morgan, 1990).

Maternal depression can affect the development of self-efficacy in several ways during toddlerhood. Depressed mothers may model low-efficacy behaviors for their toddler. They may also be less facilitating of their toddler's efforts—either because depressed mothers are less reinforcing in general or because they are less hopeful that their toddler's efforts will be successful. In addition to these environmental means of transmission, genetic contributions from the depressed mother are likely to contribute to low self-efficacy.

As suggested above, timing of exposure to depression is theoretically important because emerging developmental skills are most likely to be affected by exposure to maternal depression. Depression can take many forms from chronic to a single isolated episode (varying in length of time). More common are episodes of depression separated by partial or complete remission. The issue of timing of exposure has received little empirical attention (Campbell & Cohen, 1997).

In the current study, we examined self-efficacy in 18-month-old toddlers who had been exposed to clinically significant maternal depression and compared them to toddlers of mothers who had never been depressed. Depressed mothers were required to have experienced an episode of depression since their toddler's birth. Mothers' depression status was assessed with a structured interview, and the course of depression was tracked across the 18 months of the toddler's life. By using a homogeneous age group, we were able to use more developmentally appropriate measures than are possible in samples with a wider age range, as is typical in research on children of clinically depressed mothers. We hypothesized that toddlers whose mothers had experienced an episode of depression in their toddler's lifetime would have lower self-efficacy than toddlers of never-depressed mothers. Furthermore, we hypothesized that the lowest level of self-efficacy would be found in toddlers who were more recently exposed to maternal depression.

Section snippets

Participants

Participants were 132 mothers and their 18-month-old toddlers (71 boys and 61 girls). Two families who participated in the larger longitudinal study (of 134 families) were not included in the present study: one toddler refused to play with the mastery toys and one family was unable to come for the 18-month playroom session. Of the 132 mothers, 62 had never been depressed and 70 had experienced a clinical depression within the toddler's lifetime. All but one depressed mother met DSM-IV criteria

Preliminary analyses

We first checked for any demographic differences between the depressed and nondepressed groups. The only significant difference was that toddlers of depressed mothers were less likely to have the father in the home than toddlers of nondepressed mothers, t(130) = 2.08, p < .05; however, the father was in the home in most families of both depressed and nondepressed mothers (87% versus 97%). Differences in the mean amount of time that toddlers of depressed versus nondepressed mothers spent in

Discussion

These results support our hypothesis that toddlers who are exposed to maternal depression demonstrate less self-efficacy than nonexposed toddlers. Specifically, toddlers of nondepressed mothers were more persistent, required fewer prompts, were more likely to show pride, and, marginally, showed more mastery pleasure when given a variety of mastery tasks. Moreover, recency of exposure to depression was important. Currently exposed toddlers had the lowest level of self-efficacy while

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by NIMH Grant R01MH49419 awarded to the first author. We wish to thank the research assistants who helped with this study and especially the families who participated.

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