Depression and Social Anxiety in Children: Differential Links with Coping Strategies

Abstract

Strategies that children use for coping with stressors are known to be related to emotional adjustment, but not enough is understood about specific links with social anxiety and depression. The present investigation tested differentiated associations of social anxiety and depression with specific types of coping strategies, and evaluated the direction of these associations over time. In Study 1, 404 children aged 8-13 years completed a coping scale modified from Kochendefer-Ladd and Skinner (Developmental Psychology 38:267-278, 2002) in order to evaluate factor structure and subscale internal consistency. In Study 2, 270 8-11-year-old children completed depression and social anxiety scales, a sociometric survey, and the coping scale from Study 1, with a follow-up timepoint 9 months later. In Study 1, factor analysis revealed six internally consistent coping subscales. In Study 2, social anxiety and depression were found to have distinctive longitudinal associations with subsequent coping strategies. Decreased problem-solving, social support-seeking, and distraction were uniquely predicted by depression but not by social anxiety. Internalising coping was a stronger outcome of social anxiety, and increased externalising was uniquely predicted by depression. There was also some evidence for a moderating role of peer relations. However, none of the coping strategies predicted changes in depression or social anxiety over the two timepoints. These results highlight the impact that emotional adjustment may have on children's coping strategies, and clarify important distinctions between social anxiety and depression in relation to coping.Keywords Social anxiety . Depression . Coping . Peer relations . LongitudinalResearch has shown that social anxiety and depression regularly co-occur (Ingram et al. 2001). For instance, of people with a lifetime diagnosis of social phobia, 37.2% also had a lifetime diagnosis of major depression (Kessler et al. 1994). There is also substantial co-morbidity between depression and social anxiety in childhood, with a review by King et al. (1991) finding correlations based on self-reports ranging from 0.40 to 0.70 in clinical and non-clinical samples. Nonetheless, there is also clear evidence of differentiation between social anxiety and depression with respect to various behavioural, emotional and cognitive characteristics (Brady and Kendall 1992;Ogul and Gencoz 2003;Hong 2007).In an attempt to understand these similarities and differences, the tripartite model of anxiety and depression Psychol (2010) 38:405-419 DOI 10.1007 (Clark and Watson 1991) proposes that there is a common core of high negative affect (e.g., feeling upset) in both disorders, but also that positive affect (e.g., enthusiasm) is low especially in depression, whereas physiological hyperarousal (e.g., nervousness) is high especially in anxiety. This model has also been used as a framework for understanding these conditions in children (e.g., Crook et al. 1998;Laurent and Ettelson 2001), and though there has bee...

Depressive symptoms and emotion regulation strategies in children with and without developmental language disorder: a longitudinal study

“…2010), which has shown to be reliable in children with lower language abilities (Theunissen et al . 2011).…”

“…Here we focus on four main categories: approach and avoidant ER strategies, which are often found to be adaptive, as well as worry and externalizing strategies, which are considered maladaptive strategies (Fields and Prinz 1997, Wright et al . 2010). …”

“…Indeed, more externalizing strategies are associated with higher levels of depressive symptoms in children (Wright et al . 2010). Although externalizing strategies are common in toddlers, a sharp decrease in externalizing strategies is noted when children become able to communicate their emotions through language (Fields and Prinz 1997), During childhood and adolescence relatively low and stable levels of externalizing strategies are found (Fields and Prinz 1997, Zimmer‐Gembeck and Skinner 2011), although some studies found an increase during puberty (Zimmer‐Gembeck and Skinner 2011).…”

Emotional Profile and Intellectual Functioning

“…Moreover, anxiety disorders are frequently associated with depressive symptoms with rates ranging from 16% to 50% increasing in chronicity and severity (Jacobson & Newman, 2014). The consequence is the interference with daily functioning (Wright et al, 2010).…”

Escala de afrontamiento en niños: propiedades psicométricas

“…En este sentido, estrategias de tipo evitativo se asocian con síntomas depresivos, mayores niveles de comportamiento agresivo y ansiedad autoinformada (Seiffge-Krenke y Klessinger, 2000; Seiffge-Krenke y Stemmler, 2002). Por el contrario, se constata que estrategias de afrontamiento de aproximación al problema se asocian a resultados favorables de adaptación socioemocional en la infancia (Frydenberg y Lewis, 1999a, 1999bGarnefski, Boon y Kraaij, 2003;Hampel y Petermann, 2006;Wadsworth y Compas, 2002;Wright, Banerjee, Hoek, Rieffe y Novin, 2010). La evaluación de las estrategias de afrontamiento es prioritaria para desarrollar actuaciones de diagnóstico y tratamientos clínicos, así como para garantizar el éxito de la intervención psicoeducativa y la orientación escolar.…”