Citation

van Ettekoven KM, Rasing SPA, Vermulst AA, Engels RCME, Kindt KCM, Creemers DHM. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2020; 17(4): e1380.

Affiliation

Behavioral Science Institute, Radboud University, P.O. Box 9104, 6500 HE Nijmegen, The Netherlands.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2020, MDPI: Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute)

DOI

10.3390/ijerph17041380

PMID

32098035

Abstract

Depressive disorders are highly prevalent during adolescence and they are a major concern for individuals and society. The Response Style Theory and the Scar Theory both suggest a relationship between response styles and depressive symptoms, but the theories differ in the order of the development of depressive symptoms. Longitudinal reciprocal prospective relationships between depressive symptoms and response styles were examined in a community sample of 1343 adolescents. Additionally, response style was constructed with the traditional approach, which involves examining three response styles separately without considering the possible relations between them, and with the ratio approach, which accounts for all three response styles simultaneously. No reciprocal relationships between depressive symptoms and response style were found over time. Only longitudinal relationships between response style and depressive symptoms were significant. This study found that only depressive symptoms predicted response style, whereas the response style did not emerge as an important underlying mechanism responsible for developing and maintaining depressive symptoms in adolescents. These findings imply that prevention and intervention programs for adolescents with low depressive symptoms should not focus on adaptive and maladaptive response style strategies to decrease depressive symptoms, but should focus more on behavioral interventions.

Language: en

Keywords

adolescents; cross-lagged model; depression; emotion regulation; response style