Resilience among children and adolescents at risk for depression: Mediation and moderation across social and neurobiological contexts

Abstract

This article offers a multilevel perspective on resilience to depression, with a focus on interactions among social and neurobehavioral systems involved in emotional reactivity and regulation. We discuss models of cross-contextual mediation and moderation by which the social context influences or modifies the effects of resilience processes at the biological level, or the biological context influences or modifies the effects of resilience processes at the social level. We highlight the socialization of emotion regulation as a candidate process contributing to resilience against depression at the social context level. We discuss several factors and their interactions across levels-including genetic factors, stress reactivity, positive affect, neural systems of reward, and sleep-as candidate processes contributing to resilience against depression at the neurobehavioral level. We then present some preliminary supportive findings from two studies of children and adolescents at high risk for depression. Study 1 shows that elevated neighborhood level adversity has the potential to constrain or limit the benefits of protective factors at other levels. Study 2 indicates that ease and quickness in falling asleep and a greater amount of time in deep Stage 4 sleep may be protective against the development of depressive disorders for children. The paper concludes with a discussion of clinical implications of this approach.

The relationship of resilience, hardiness, depression and burnout among Japanese psychiatric hospital nurses

“…For understanding the relationship between resilience and depression, a multilevel perspective is necessary. As Silk et al [26] discussed, mediation and moderation across social and neurobiological contexts influence the effects of resilient processes. In the context of psychiatric hospitals, it is likely that the level of workplace adversity has the potential to influence the benefits of resilience processes against depression.…”

Cardiac Vagal Control and Depressive Symptoms: The Moderating Role of Sleep Quality

“…This points to the possibility for high sleep quality being a protective factor in the development of depressive symptoms. One longitudinal study provided support for this idea by showing that resilient young adults who did not develop depressive symptoms (despite low socioeconomic status) demonstrated shorter sleep latency and enhanced deep sleep (both indicators of better sleep) during childhood (Silk et al, 2007). …”

Protective Factors and the Development of Resilience in the Context of Neighborhood Disadvantage

“…In fact, several studies have found that some protective factors are diminished in the context of severe neighborhood disadvantage (Silk et al 2007;Stouthamer-Loeber et al 2002), with differences emerging between low income urban neighborhoods and inner city neighborhoods or projects Shaw et al 2004). Thus it is important to determine whether protective factors work similarly across levels of neighborhood disadvantage, or whether the benefits are limited to specific contexts.…”