A Prospective Study of Brooding and Reflection as Moderators of the Relationship between Stress and Depressive Symptoms in Adolescence

Abstract

This study examined rumination as a moderator of the relationship between stress and depressive symptoms in a sample of adolescents using a multi-wave prospective design. Stressors were analyzed by domain (independent/ dependent and interpersonal/noninterpersonal) and both brooding and reflection subtypes of rumination were examined as moderators. At the baseline assessment, 111 adolescents (ages 14-19) reported rumination and depressive symptoms. Youth were subsequently asked to complete a weekly diary assessment for 8 consecutive weeks, and again at 12 weeks, during which stressors and depressive symptoms were reported. Results indicated that brooding, but not reflection, moderated the relationship between stress and depression, for nearly all domains of stress. All results were in the expected direction, suggesting that the greater tendency to brood exacerbates the effects of stress on depression, whereas the greater tendency to reflect does not.

An 18-month study of the effects of IBD symptomatology and emotion regulation on depressed mood

“…Furthermore, the current study also shows that the tendency to engage in cognitive fusion and brooding to deal with difficult experiences leads to increased subsequent depressive symptoms. This finding supports previous literature concerning the longitudinal effects of brooding on depression levels [50,51] and further expands it by uncovering this causal relationship in IBD patients. On the other hand, to our present 17 knowledge, this is the first study to verify the causal predictive value of cognitive fusion on course of depressive symptomatology.…”

Rumination in Adolescence: the Distinctive Impact of Brooding and Reflection on Psychopathology

“…These findings are very similar to those obtained among adult (Dinis et al, 2011;Treynor et al, 2003) and adolescent populations (Burwell & Shirk, 2007;Cox et al, 2012;Cunha et al, 2015).…”

“…In turn, Burwell and Shirk (2007) conducted a short-term longitudinal study in a community sample of adolescents and found that both brooding and reflection were associated concurrently with depressive symptoms (r = .69, r = .17, respectively), but only brooding predicted the development of depressive symptoms over time, particularly for girls. Moreover, brooding (but not reflection) seems to play a moderator role in the relationship between stress (interpersonal stress) and depressive symptoms (Cox, Funasaki, Smith, & Mezulis, 2012), specially for girls with high levels of co-rumination (Bastin, Mezulis, Ahles, Raes, & Bijttebier, 2014). Although rumination is consistently considered in relation to depression, several studies have demonstrated associations between rumination and various internalizing symptoms, such as anxiety, worry, trauma-related symptoms and levels of stress (Nolen-Hoeksema et al, 2008).…”

“…Furthermore, brooding has been consistently associated with depressive symptoms, whereas the impact of reflection component in relation to depressive symptoms is not clear (Cox et al, 2012;Verstraeten et al, 2010). Nolen-Hoeksema and Girgus (1994), based on RST, stated that the emergence of gender differences in depression during the transition from pre-adolescence to adolescence might be partially explained by ruminative tendencies in dealing with external stressors or stressful life events.…”

The influence of cognitive control training on stress reactivity and rumination in response to a lab stressor and naturalistic stress

“…Follow-up) x 2 (Group: CCT vs. VST) Mixed ANOVA to examine effects of CCT on stress resilience in a naturalistic context. Stress resilience was operationalized by brooding scores (RRS; dependent variable), the more depressive subtype of rumination (Cox et al, 2012). The following results are based on the subsample which completed the follow-up assessment during the first two weeks of their examination period (CCT group: n = 20; VST group: n = 17).…”