The role of family processes in depressive symptom recovery during the transition to adolescence

Katharine Ann Buck

doi:10.15761/mhar.1000157

Abstract

The role of family processes in depressive symptom recovery during the transition to adolescence

Highlights

Depression is the most common mental health disorder of adolescence, placing youth at risk for suicide, academic failure, substance abuse, and troubled relationships [1]
Using data from 956 adolescents ages 11 to 15 who participated in the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development, the current study examined the role of four family factors – a two-parent household, interparental intimacy, the parent-child relationship, and parental depression – in predicting depressive symptom trajectories as children enter adolescence
The current study examines the role of family relationships and one component of family structure – a two-parent household – in depressive symptom recovery as children transition into adolescence

Summary

Introduction

Depression is the most common mental health disorder of adolescence, placing youth at risk for suicide, academic failure, substance abuse, and troubled relationships [1]. Depressive symptoms increase approximately threefold from late childhood to early adolescence [2] This common developmental trend fails to capture the heterogeneity of depressive symptom trajectories [10,11]. Six studies have demonstrated that some children and adolescents with moderate to high depressive symptoms show improvement over time, without treatment. This trajectory research has found that declines in depressive symptoms occur across development: from early childhood through late adolescence (ages 4-18), late childhood to early adolescence (11-15), late adolescence (11-18), and early adulthood (ages 12-25), and from late adolescence to early adulthood (18-22) [4,5,6,10,12]

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Conclusion