Mediating effects of neurotic personality between parental rearing patterns and depressive symptom in middle-school students

Abstract

Objective To investigate the mediating effects of neurotic personality between parental rearing patterns and depressive symptom. Methods Using multistage sampling method, 982 town middle-school students were surveyed by the Symptom Checklist 90(SCL-90), the Egna Minnen av Barndoms Uppfostran(EMBU), the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire(EPQ). Correlation and regression analysis, mediating effect test, and structural equation model were constructed. Results ①Depressive symptom(D) (1.73±0.72) was significantly associated with Neurotic personality(N) (51.50±11.37) and parental rearing patterns (r=-0.138-0.582, P<0.01). ②N, mother's rejection and deny(M3), father's emotional warmth and understanding(F1), father's over-protection(F6) had a direct effect on D, which can explain 41.6% of the variance. F1, F6, mother's over-interference and over-protection(M2), M3 had a direct effect on N, which can explain 15.3% of the variance. The mediating effect of N between F1, F6, M2 and D were significant(95%CI=-0.212--0.069, -0.351--0.233, 0.414-0.480). ③The explanation for D was 41.3%.N had completely mediating effect between M2 and depressive symptom.N had partial mediating effect between F1, F6 and D, and the proportion was 43.6% and 49.1%. Conclusion Neurotic personality plays a mediating role between parental rearing patterns and depressive symptom in middle-school students. Key words: Middle-school student; Parental rearing patterns; Neurotic personality; Depressive symptom; Mediation effect