A test of the cognitive diathesis-stress model of depression in children: Academic stressors, attributional style, perceived competence, and control.

Abstract

The cognitive diathesis-stress model of depression was tested in a sample of 439 children in grades 5 and 6. Attributional style and cognitions about academic competence and control over achievement were assessed before the occurrence of a potentially stressful event--receiving unacceptable grades on a report card. Depressive symptoms were assessed 1 week before the event, the morning after, and 5 days later. Replicating G. I. Metalsky, L. J. Halberstadt, and L. Y. Abramson (1987), stressor level and negative cognitions predicted depressive symptoms the morning after the event, controlling for initial symptom levels. Depressive symptoms 5 days later were predicted by the interactions of negative cognitions with stressors, supporting a cognitive diathesis-stress model. Students who reported a negative explanatory style or lack of academic control and competence expressed more distress after receiving unacceptable grades than did students without such cognitions.

Cognitive Moderators of the Longitudinal Association Between Peer Rejection and Adolescent Depressive Symptoms

“…This finding complements both developmental studies regarding the importance of peer rejection and a growing number of clinical investigations that generally provide support for cognitive vulnerability-stress models in adolescence (Dixon & Ahrens, 1992;Hilsman & Garber, 1995;Nolen-Hoeksema et al, 1992;Robinson et al, 1995). Findings regarding the specificity of this model for girls are consistent with recent theories regarding the importance of interpersonal stressors in the development of depressive symptoms among females in particular, as well as increased cognitive vulnerabilities among girls during this critical developmental period associated with differential prevalence of depression ).…”

Perceived Stress and Psychiatric Symptoms in Swedish Upper Secondary School Students

“…Strong associations have also been found for perceived stress, psychosomatic symptoms, and anxiety (Wiklund et al, 2012). There is also growing evidence of a significant relationship between psychosocial stress and psychopathology in children and adolescents from both cross-sectional (Compas, 1987;Compas, Connor-Smith, Saltzman, Thomsen, & Wadsworth, 2001) and longitudinal studies (Hammen & Goodman-Brown, 1990;Hilsman & Garber, 1995;Rudolph, Lambert, Clark, & Kurlakowsky, 2001;Schmeelk-Cone & Zimmerman, 2003).…”

Cognitive Vulnerability–Stress Model of Depression During Adolescence: Investigating Depressive Symptom Specificity in a Multi-Wave Prospective Study

“…Building on these foundational models, proposed that the interaction of cognitive vulnerability, such as HT's negative inferential style, with negative events would be an etiologically specific risk factor for depression, whereas the occurrence of negative events, without elevated cognitive vulnerability, would contribute to general negative affect and predict symptoms of psychopathology (e.g., externalizing, internalizing, anxious arousal) broadly. Consistent with this notion, prospective research has found that a negative attributional style interacts with stressors to predict future increases in depressive symptoms and disorder among youth (e.g., Abela 2001;Dixon and Ahrens 1992;Lewinsohn et al 2001;Hilsman and Garber 1995;Robinson et al 1995;see Lakdawalla et al 2007, for a review). Negative events are broadly associated with anxiety, depression, and externalizing problems (McMahon et al 2003).…”