Does supportive parenting mitigate the longitudinal effects of peer victimization on depressive thoughts and symptoms in children?

Cohen and Wills (Cohen, S., & Wills, T. A.

Impact of physical and relational peer victimization on depressive cognitions in children and adolescents.

The purpose of this study is to find longitudinal evidence of the effect of targeted peer victimization (TPV) on depressive cognitions as a function of victimization type and gender. Prospective relations of physical and relational peer victimization to positive and negative self-cognitions were examined in a 1-year, 2-wave longitudinal study. Self-reports of cognitions and both peer nomination and self-report measures of peer victimization experiences were obtained from 478 predominantly Caucasian children and young adolescents (Grades 3-6 at the beginning of the study) evenly split between genders.

Are increased weight and appetite useful indicators of depression in children and adolescents?

During childhood and adolescence, physiological, psychological, and behavioral processes strongly promote weight gain and increased appetite while also inhibiting weight loss and decreased appetite. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-IV (DSM-IV) treats both weight-gain/increased-appetite and weight-loss/decreased-appetite as symptoms of major depression during these developmental periods, despite the fact that one complements typical development and the other opposes it. To disentangle the developmental versus pathological correlates of weight and appetite disturbance in younger age groups, the current study examined symptoms of depression in an aggregated sample of 2307 children and adolescents, 47.

Development and initial validation of the Adolescent Responses to Body Dissatisfaction measure.

One community sample (N = 607) of youths generated self-reported responses to body dissatisfaction, from which the Adolescent Responses to Body Dissatisfaction (ARBD) inventory was constructed. A 2nd, similar sample (N = 830) completed this measure as well as measures of coping, body dissatisfaction, body mass index, depressive symptoms, and disordered eating behaviors. Evidence of 6 ARBD factors emerged: Self-Acceptance, Compensatory Thinking, Diet/Exercise, Anxious Responding, Appearance Strategies, and Social Comparison.

A Longitudinal Study of Cognitive Risks for Depressive Symptoms in Children and Young Adolescents.

Youths with high ( = 52) or low cognitive vulnerability ( = 48) for depression were selected from a larger sample ( = 515) of students (7-10 years old), based on their attributional style (AS), negative cognitions (NC), and/or self-competence (SC). Long-term effects of cognitive vulnerabilities on depressive symptoms were examined in a 3-year, three-wave, multiinformant, longitudinal design. Three findings emerged.

Targeted peer victimization and the construction of positive and negative self-cognitions: connections to depressive symptoms in children.

The goal was to examine the relation of covert/relational and overt/physical targeted peer victimization (TPV) to each other, to positive and negative self-cognitions, and to symptoms of depression. In a sample of elementary and middle school children, TPV was assessed by self-report, peer-nomination, and parent report in a multitrait-multimethod study. Positive and negative self-cognitions and depressive symptoms were assessed by self-report.

The relation of weight change to depressive symptoms in adolescence.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders lists weight gain or weight loss as a symptom of depression at all ages, but no study of adolescent depression has examined its relation to actual (not just self-reported) weight change. In the current longitudinal study, 215 adolescents provided physical and self-report measures of change in weight, body mass, and body fat over a 4-month time interval. They also completed psychological measures of body dissatisfaction, problematic eating attitudes, and depressive symptoms.

Gender differences in the longitudinal structure of cognitive diatheses for depression in children and adolescents.

In a school-based, four-wave, longitudinal study, children (grades 4-7) and young adolescents (grades 6-9) completed questionnaires measuring depressive symptoms and depressive cognitions, including positive and negative cognitions on the Cognitive Triad Inventory for Children (CTI-C; Kaslow, Stark, Printz, Livingston, & Tsai, 1992) and self-perceived competence on the Self-Perception Profile for Children (SPPC; Harter, 1985). Application of the Trait-State-Occasion model (Cole, Martin, & Steiger, 2005) revealed the existence of a time-invariant trait factor and a set of time-varying occasion factors. Gender differences emerged, indicating that some cognitive diatheses were more trait-like for girls than for boys (i.

Weight change and appetite disturbance as symptoms of adolescent depression: toward an integrative biopsychosocial model.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders [American Psychiatric Association. (1994). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (4th ed.

Assessment of hyperphagia in Prader-Willi syndrome.

Objective: Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS), the leading known genetic cause of obesity, is characterized by intellectual disabilities, maladaptive and compulsive behaviors, and hyperphagia. Although complications of obesity resulting from hyperphagia are the leading cause of death in PWS, quantifying this drive for food has long been an unmet research need. This study provides factor-analytic and within-syndrome analyses of a new measure of hyperphagia in PWS.