Do girls with depressive symptoms exhibit more physical aggression than boys? A cross sectional study in a national adolescent sample.

Xavier Benarous,David Cohen,Bruno Falissard,Angèle Consoli,Christine Hassler

doi:10.1186/s13034-015-0064-5

Abstract

BackgroundThe relationship between depression and aggressive behaviors in adolescents has previously been reported in clinical and epidemiological studies. However, there is conflicting evidence concerning the effect of gender on this relationship. This study tested whether the link between depressive symptoms and physical aggression differed between boys and girls in a large community-based sample of adolescents.MethodsA cross-sectional sample of adolescents aged 15–19 (N = 6,677) was studied within the 2007 ESPAD national survey. Depressive symptoms were assessed using the Adolescent Depression Rating Scale. We distinguished adolescents with subthreshold levels of depressive symptoms and adolescents with clinically significant levels of depressive symptoms. Physical aggressive behaviors in the last year were reported using items from the Antisocial Behavior Scale.ResultsAfter adjusting for confounding variables, the odds-ratio between depressive symptoms and physical aggressive behaviors was around 1.4. This relationship was stronger for girls than for boys in presence of clinically significant levels of depressive symptoms, but did not differ between the genders in the case of subthreshold levels of depressive symptoms.ConclusionsGirls with severe depressive symptoms were more likely to present physical aggressive behaviors than boys. Future studies will be needed to explore the role of irritability in these differences.

Highlights

The relationship between depression and aggressive behaviors in adolescents has previously been reported in clinical and epidemiological studies
To provide additional support that the gender difference in the relation between depressive symptoms and physical aggressive behaviors was specific to physical aggression and not to antisocial behavior in general, we explored whether the association between depressive symptoms and other antisocial behaviors differed by genders
Physical aggressive behaviors were reported by 42% of the adolescents, 33% of the girls and 51% of the boys, χ2 (1, N = 6,486) = 323.33, p < 0.001, φ = 0.22

Summary

Introduction

The relationship between depression and aggressive behaviors in adolescents has previously been reported in clinical and epidemiological studies. The relationship between depressive symptoms and aggressive behaviors has previously been reported in clinical [5,6,7,8], and epidemiological studies [9,10,11] This association is important to consider for clinicians, as aggressive behavior may hide core thymic symptoms [1, 12,13,14], and excessive focus on external behaviors can lead to a misdiagnosis of depressive disorder at this age. This is regrettable given the evidence that early recognition and treatment could limit functional impairment [12]. Girls with depressive disorder associated with behavioral problems (including aggression) appear to present poorer outcomes compared

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Discussion

Conclusion