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The Role of Positive Schemas in Child Psychopathology and Resilience

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Abstract

Cognitive models of child psychopathology rarely consider positive schemas in models of risk. This study presents the new Positive Schema Questionnaire (PSQ) for youth, evaluating relations of positive schema themes to depression, anxiety, and resilience. Adolescent boys (n = 84) and girls (n = 88), aged 9–14 (M = 11.44), completed the PSQ, and measures of negative schemas, depression, anxiety, and resilience. Exploratory factor analyses of the PSQ supported a five-factor structure including themes of: Self-Efficacy, Optimism, Trust, Success, and Worthiness. Supporting its discriminant validity, the PSQ predicted additional variance in depression, anxiety, and resilience, beyond that predicted by negative schemas. Furthermore, the content specificity model as envisioned for negative schemas, was found to apply to positive schemas, with themes of Worthiness most predictive of depression and Self-Efficacy most predictive of anxiety and resilience. Findings have implications for incorporating positive schemas into cognitive models of psychopathology.

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Notes

  1. Positive schemas and resilience are related constructs. To support positive schemas as theoretically distinct from resilience, hierarchical linear regression analyses were conducted controlling for resilience while regressing (1) depression and (2) anxiety symptoms on positive schemas. In these analyses, predictor variables were entered in 3 steps: sex, resilience, and positive schemas. In the third step, analyses confirmed that positive schemas predict unique variance in depression [ΔR 2 = .32, F(1, 166) = .904, p < .01] and anxiety [ΔR 2 = .02, F(1, 166) = .049, p < .01] beyond resilience, suggesting distinct constructs.

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by the Ontario Mental Health Foundation New Investigator Fellowship (second author). We are very grateful to the Wellington Catholic District School Board for their support of our research and to the youth and parents who participated in this project. We are also grateful to all the members of the Resilient Youth Research Group for their research efforts in the schools and in particular to Rachel Tomlinson and Bethany Lerman for their extraordinary organizational skills and valuable contributions to many aspects of this project. We also wish to thank Wray Hutton for his guidance on appropriate computer infrastructure and his computer-programming expertise.

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  1. Department of Psychology, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, N1G 2W1, Canada

    L. Keyfitz, M. N. Lumley & K. H. Hennig

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Western Ontario, London, ON, Canada

    D. J. A. Dozois

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  1. L. Keyfitz
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Keyfitz, L., Lumley, M.N., Hennig, K.H. et al. The Role of Positive Schemas in Child Psychopathology and Resilience. Cogn Ther Res 37, 97–108 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-012-9455-6

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