When Depression Breeds Rejection Rather Than Compassion: Disagreeableness, Stigma, and Lack of Empathic Concern Among Support Providers

Myriam Mongrain,Ariel Shoikhedbrod

doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2021.594229

Abstract

Past research has shown that the close relationships of depressed individuals are often characterised by rejection rather than compassion. The goal of this research was to broaden interpersonal models of depression by investigating the reports of support providers themselves. Individual differences, including disagreeableness, stigmatic beliefs about depression, and empathic concern were measured. These were examined in relation to reported interpersonal behaviours toward a significant other who was currently depressed. A cross-sectional design was used in an undergraduate (N = 312) and community sample (N = 296). Disagreeable individuals reported less compassionate and more rejecting behaviours toward depressed significant others based on an interpersonal circumplex model of social support. Serial mediation models further indicated that the associations between disagreeableness and rejecting behaviours reported by providers were mediated by stigma and lower empathic concern. The current studies shed light on how the personality, attitudes and emotions of support providers influence the level of compassion expressed toward depressed individuals.

Highlights

Compassion involves a deep awareness of the suffering of another coupled with the wish to relieve it
Study 1 In the preliminary analyses, we examined the descriptive properties of the interpersonal circumplex as well as the correlations between disagreeableness, depression stigma, FIGURE 1 | Radar chart of Disagreeableness, Empathic concern and Depression stigma projected on to the SAS-C in Study 1
The results indicate an excellent fit to a circumplex configuration for all the criterion variables

Summary

Introduction

Compassion involves a deep awareness of the suffering of another coupled with the wish to relieve it. Meta-analytic reviews of experimental interventions designed to increase compassionate responding have confirmed the causal relationship between kindness and subjective well-being [7, 8]. Despite these redemptive qualities, compassion can be conspicuously absent in some interpersonal situations involving a significant other who is experiencing emotional suffering. Depressed individuals are more likely to report rejection rather than compassion from others in their immediate social environment [9, 10]. Attitudes, and emotions reported by support providers as they relate to compassionate vs rejecting behaviours toward depressed individuals

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Discussion

Conclusion