Developmental Origins of Rumination in Middle Childhood: The Roles of Early Temperament and Positive Parenting

Abstract

Rumination, a thinking style characterized by a repetitive inward focus on negative cognitions, has been linked to internalizing disorders, particularly depression. Moreover, research suggests that rumination may be a cognitive vulnerability that predisposes individuals to psychopathology. Surprisingly little is known, however, about the etiology and development of rumination. The present study examined the role of specific components of child temperamental negative emotionality (sadness, fear, anger) and effortful control (inhibition), as well as parenting behaviors during early childhood on the development of rumination in middle childhood. Early childhood (age 3) temperament and parenting behaviors were assessed observationally and rumination was self-reported in middle childhood (age 9) in a large community sample (N = 425; 47.1% female). Two significant interactions emerged. First, temperamental anger interacted with inhibitory control (IC) such that high anger and low IC predicted higher levels of rumination, whereas low anger and low IC predicted lower levels of rumination. Second, IC interacted with parenting such that children with low IC and positive parenting had lower levels of rumination. In contrast, children with high IC reported similar levels of rumination regardless of parenting quality. Overall, these findings highlight the interplay of early IC with temperamental anger and positive parenting in the development of ruminative tendencies in middle childhood.

Bridge symptoms between parenting styles and proximal psychological risk factors associated with adolescent suicide: a network analysis

“…First, we found that the proximal psychological variables (i.e., Resilience, Afraid, Concentration, Rumination, and Anger) have the highest bridge strengths in the current adolescent psychosocial network, serving as bridge symptoms connecting clusters of parenting styles and psychological variables. This observed relationship is consistent with previous longitudinal and meta-analytic ndings on the association between adolescents' emotional, cognitive, and behavioral problems and negative parenting styles [44,45], It is acknowledged that parenting styles exert profound effects on shaping psychological development in childhood and adolescence [46,47], and adolescents tend to respond with dysfunctional emotion or negative behavior when their emotional needs are not met by their parents during this critical and challenging period [48], Thus, negative parenting styles act as a factor that increases the activation of rumination, anxiety, and depression and decreases adolescents' resilience through the psychosocial network. However, further studies are needed to determine a causal relationship among the aforementioned factors.…”

Maternal Depression, Child Temperament, and Early-Life Stress Predict Never-Depressed Preadolescents’ Functional Connectivity During a Negative-Mood Induction

“…This is unsurprising given the shared valence of these two constructs. The relatively stronger association between sadness and FC (compared with PE and FC) may be related to rumination given that rumination has been found to be associated with both early NE (Schweizer et al, 2018) and altered neural patterns during negative-emotion processing (Mandell et al, 2014). Although the paradigm used in this study did not tap into ruminative processes, future studies that directly measure rumination will help illuminate the relationships between early temperament, rumination, and brain function subserving emotion processing.…”

Early Emergence of Rumination has no Association with Performance on a Non-affective Inhibitory Control Task

“…Other studies on pre-adolescents [ 36 ] and late adolescents [ 37 ] did not find support for an association between inhibition and rumination. Findings from another community-sampled study indicated that inhibitory control weakness at age 3 was predictive of elevated rumination levels at age 9, but only in the context of having a highly angry temperament in early childhood [ 38 ]. In one adolescent community sample, rumination was associated with inhibition weakness during an emotional Go/No-Go task, especially in response to negative information when shifting from negative to positive stimuli, but not during a non-affective task assessing inhibition [ 39 ].…”

“…In Olson et al’s (1992) Circumplex Model of family systems, healthy family functioning encompasses a positive communication style, balanced levels of cohesion or the emotional bond between family members, and adaptability in a family when facing a stressor [ 55 ]. One study found that children with poor IC ruminated less if they had parents who displayed positive communication and interaction styles compared to children whose parents displayed negative communication styles [ 38 ]. However, the overall lack of research on the associations among CM, family support, rumination, and IC in adolescence presents a missed opportunity for research on vulnerability factors for depression.…”