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Maternal Child-Rearing Attitudes and Role Satisfaction and Children's Temperament as Antecedents of Adolescent Depressive Tendencies: Follow-up Study of 6- to 15-Year-Olds

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Abstract

Development of depressive tendencies was assessed over a 9-year period in a random sample of 389 Finnish children. Predictors of maternal role satisfaction and hostile child-rearing attitudes, assessed when the children were ages 6 and 9 years, respectively, and a temperament predictor of perceived child difficultness, assessed when the children were age 6 years, were measured using questionnaires designed for this study. Depressive tendencies were assessed by a self-report at age 15 (modification of Beck's Depression Inventory). Using structural equation modeling, we tested a hypothesized model comprising direct as well as mediated effects between the childhood predictor variables and adolescent depressive tendencies. The results indicated support for a similar mediational model in girls and boys. Low maternal role satisfaction and maternal perceptions of child difficultness, measured when children were age 6 years, predicted hostile maternal child-rearing attitudes measured when children were age 9 years, which in turn had a significant direct effect on depressive tendencies among these children during adolescence. The only other direct effect was found solely in girls: Low maternal role satisfaction predicted adolescent depressive tendencies. These results underline the close interplay of child temperament and mothering factors in the development of depressive tendencies in girls and boys.

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  1. Department of Psychology, University of Helsinki, Finland

    Saara Katainen (Postgraduate Researcher), Katri Räikkönen (Senior Researcher, Department of Psychology, University of Helsinki, Finland), Pertti Keskivaara (Researcher, Department of Psychology, University of Helsinki, Finland) & Liisa Keltikangas-Järvinen (Professor of Psychology, Department of Psychology, University of Helsinki, Finland)

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  1. Saara Katainen
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Katainen, S., Räikkönen, K., Keskivaara, P. et al. Maternal Child-Rearing Attitudes and Role Satisfaction and Children's Temperament as Antecedents of Adolescent Depressive Tendencies: Follow-up Study of 6- to 15-Year-Olds. Journal of Youth and Adolescence 28, 139–163 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1021645213549

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