Abstract
Background
While important links have been described between childhood abuse and propensity to develop depressive disorders in adult life, less is known about mechanisms, such as identity and shame, that may contribute to this relationship and the effects of age.
Objective
We examined the association between perceived childhood abuse and depressive symptoms––with age as a potential moderating variable––and including dysfunctional identity and shame as mediators of this relation.
Methods
This cross-sectional correlational study recruited 393 participants through the Prolific Academic platform. Average age was 34.26 (SD = 12.67; range = 18–75); 69.5% identified as women, 29% as men, and 1.3% as non-binary gender. Validated scales assessed childhood abuse history (abuse subscale of the Measure of Parental Style), identity dysfunction (self-Concept and Identity Measure), shame (abbreviated version of the Personal Feelings Questionnaire-2) and depressive symptoms (Patient Health Questionnaire-8). Linear regression was used to examine moderation effects, and conditional process modelling, combining moderation with parallel mediation effects.
Results
Age moderated the childhood abuse-depressive symptom relationship F(3, 389) = 28.595, R2 = .181, p < .001, most significantly for individuals younger than 49. Identity dysfunction and shame mediated the abuse-depression association, moderated by age; F(3, 389) = 33.045, R2 = .203, p < .001; F(4, 389) = 67.151, R2 = .409, p < .001, respectively. Both parallel and sequential mediation effects were significant among younger adults.
Conclusions
Childhood abuse may be linked with depressive symptom severity among young adults through mechanisms of identity dysfunction and generalized shame––both in parallel and sequentially. This finding suggests possibilities for targeting identity and shame in clinical interventions among young adults with histories of childhood abuse.
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Data availability
The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
We wish to thank all study participants and the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research for providing funding for our study.
Funding
This work was supported by funding from the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research, Scholar Award #18317, awarded to Dr. David Kealy.
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Dr. David Kealy contributed to the study conception and design, while both authors contributed to material preparation, data collection and analysis, as well as manuscript preparation and approved the final manuscript.
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Approval was obtained from the University of British Columbia Behavioural Research Ethics Board. The procedures used in this study adhere to the tenets of the Declaration of Helsinki.
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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.
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Dr. David Kealy received funding from the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research, while Dr. Laura E. Labonté has no financial interests to disclose. Neither authors have non-financial interests to disclose.
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Labonté, L.E., Kealy, D. Linking childhood maltreatment and depressive symptoms: identity, shame, and age effects. Curr Psychol 43, 11904–11913 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-023-05274-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-023-05274-w