A Closer Examination of the Temporal Relationship Between Self-Competence and Depressive Symptoms During Early Adolescence. (November 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Ohannessian, Christine McCauley; Vannucci, Anna
• Other Names: Van Zalk Nejra guest-editor.
• Is Part Of: Journal of early adolescence. Volume 40:Number 9(2020)
• Page Start: 1318
• Page End: 1335
• Publication Date: 2020-11
• Subjects: adolescence -- self-competence -- depressive symptoms -- gender; Adolescence -- United States -- Periodicals; Adolescent -- Periodicals; Adolescence -- États-Unis -- Périodiques; 305.235
• DOI: 10.1177/0272431619847527
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0272-4316

Abstract

This study examined the temporal relation between self-competence and depressive symptoms in a large, diverse, U.S. community sample of 1, 344 adolescents (51% female;X ¯ a g e = 12.73, SD = .69, range = 11-14 years). Surveys were administered to seventh- and eighth-grade students at participating high schools in the fall of 2016 and the spring of 2017. Girls reported higher levels of depressive symptoms and self-competence in behavioral conduct and close friendships than boys, whereas boys reported higher levels of self-competence in athletic, physical appearance, and social domains than girls. Results from autoregressive, cross-lagged path models indicated that depressive symptoms predicted self-competence more consistently than the reverse. There were no gender differences in the associations between self-competence and depressive symptoms. Findings from this study underscore the importance of considering both directions of effect when examining psychosocial factors associated with depressive symptoms during early adolescence.