Parental Criticism and Adolescent Depression: Does Adolescent Self-Evaluation Act as a Mediator?

Abstract

A better understanding of relationships between adolescent depression and family functioning may help in devising ways to prevent development of depression and design effective therapeutic interventions. This study explored the relationship of parental emotional attitudes, (perceived criticism and expressed emotion) to adolescent self-evaluation and depression. A sample of 28 clinic-referred adolescents and their mothers participated. The Five Minute Speech Sample was used to measure parental expressed emotion, and the adolescents completed the Children's Depression Inventory, Self-Perception Profile for Children global self-worth scale, a self-criticism scale and a perceived parental criticism scale. There was partial support for a model of adolescent negative self-evaluation as a mediator in the relationship between parental emotional attitudes and adolescent depressive symptoms. The data also supported an alternative hypothesis whereby adolescent depressive symptoms are related to negative self-evaluation. The overall pattern of results emphasizes the significance of adolescents' perceptions of parental criticism, rather than actual levels, in understanding the relationship between parental emotional attitudes and adolescent depressive symptoms.