The Course of Depressive Symptoms in Men From Early Adolescence to Young Adulthood: Identifying Latent Trajectories and Early Predictors.

Abstract

Heterogeneity in the longitudinal course of depressive symptoms was studied using general growth mixture modeling for young men in the Oregon Youth Study (N = 206), from ages 15 to 24 years. Four trajectory classes were identified: the very low, the moderate-decreasing, the high-decreasing, and the high-persistent classes. The 3 lowest classes differed primarily quantitatively with the initial level or mean level across time being the major determinant of class differences, whereas the highpersistent class appeared qualitatively different in terms of long-term developmental trends and variation. Findings from univariate and multivariate analyses revealed specific effects of childhood parental, contextual, and individual risk factors on the class membership as well as on the growth within each trajectory class.

Course trajectories of unipolar depressive disorders identified by latent class growth analysis

“…Some other studies based on data-driven techniques identified family history of depressive symptomatology as a predictor for poor course trajectories. Stoolmiller et al (2005) found that parental depressive symptoms contributed to class discrimination, discriminating the high-persistent class from the other three classes. This finding was replicated by Olino et al (2010), who concluded that this pattern suggests that persistent depression may represent a more familial form of the disorder.…”

“…A more extended follow-up would enable us to investigate the prevalence of Dysth in other course trajectories. Stoolmiller et al (2005) investigated lifetime depressive diagnoses in the identified classes. None in the very low group, 5.7 % in the moderate-decreasing group, 20.0 % in the high-decreasing group and 29.2 % in the highpersistent group were diagnosed with a lifetime depressive disorder.…”

“…Colman et al (2007) examined course trajectories over the life course among the general population. However, some of these studies were limited by the inclusion of men only (Stoolmiller et al 2005), use of different measures or informants over time (Stoolmiller et al 2005 ;Colman et al 2007), or combined depressive and anxiety symptoms (Colman et al 2007). Hence, comparison of latent course trajectories with current DSM categories for depressive subtypes is lacking.…”

“…Finally, we explored the characteristics of each identified class and examined putative predictors of class membership, and hence course trajectory. In previous studies, sociodemographics, co-morbid anxiety disorders (Hayden & Klein, 2001), age of onset of depressive symptoms (Klein et al 1999 ;Angst et al 2009), childhood adversity (Hayden & Klein, 2001 ;Rhebergen et al 2011), somatic co-morbidity (Angst et al 2009), neuroticism (Hayden & Klein, 2001 ;Rhebergen et al 2011) and a family history of depression (Klein et al 1999 ;Stoolmiller et al 2005 ;Olino et al 2010) have been demonstrated to predict course trajectories. However, some inconsistencies exist.…”

“…This method can be used to determine whether different depressive subtypes based on course trajectories can be distinguished and to what extent this corresponds with the current diagnostic categories. To date, several studies have used this approach to assess course trajectories in depressive disorders across adolescence (Stoolmiller et al 2005 ;Olino et al 2010) and among mothers throughout the childrearing phase (Campbell et al 2009 ;Skipstein et al 2010), or among bereaved caregivers (Li 2005 ;Taylor et al 2008). Colman et al (2007) examined course trajectories over the life course among the general population.…”