How do my parents react when I feel happy? Longitudinal associations with adolescent depressive symptoms, anhedonia, and positive affect regulation

Abstract

Parental emotion socialization plays a role in the development of adolescents’ emotion regulation and is associated with adolescents’ depressive symptoms. Most research has focused on parental socialization of negative affect. The scarce research on parental socialization of positive affect (PA) shows that parental downgrading responses to adolescents’ PA are associated with concurrent adolescent depression. The aims of the present study were to examine longitudinal associations of both maternal and paternal responses to adolescents’ PA with how adolescents regulate their PA (i.e., dampening and enhancing) and with adolescents’ general depressive symptoms and anhedonia. We also considered associations in the opposite direction from adolescent regulatory responses and symptoms to parental responses. In a two‐wave study (1‐year interval), 635 adolescents from Grade seven completed questionnaires. Cross‐sectionally, maternal and paternal responses to adolescents’ PA were associated with concurrent adolescents’ PA regulation as well as adolescents’ depressive and anhedonic symptoms. Longitudinally, low maternal and paternal enhancing responses to adolescents’ PA predicted relative increases in anhedonic symptoms and relative decreases in adolescent enhancing over time. Low maternal enhancing was also predictive of relative increases in depressive symptoms. The present study points to bidirectionality of relations as adolescents’ level of depressive symptoms predicted maternal and paternal responses.

Positive affect regulation in youth: Taking stock and moving forward

“…Trait PA likely elicits and interacts with socialization processes to predict psychopathology (Putnam, ). For example, parents may not need to encourage their child to savor if the child is already high on temperamental positive emotionality, or conversely and in line with this quartet's papers (Moran et al, this issue, Nelis et al, this issue), parents may try more to enhance their child's PA if their child is prone to low PA or depressive symptoms (as denoted in the arrows in Figures and pointing from the child to the parent). Further, differential susceptibility theory (Belsky & Pluess, ) and vantage sensitivity theory (Pluess & Belsky, ) suggest that certain children will be more susceptible to environmental influences.…”

“…The studies in this quartet provide further evidence connecting PA regulation to youth depression, and collectively show that parent socialization of PA—particularly enhancing or savoring versus dampening—predicts children's own PA regulation and depression. Importantly, this quartet provides both cross‐sectional (Fredrick, Mancini, & Luebbe, this issue) and longitudinal evidence (Moran, Root, Vizy, Wilson, & Gentzler, this issue; Nelis, Bastin, Raes, & Bijttebier, this issue; Raval, Luebbe, & Sathiyaseelan, this issue). The validity of these associations is bolstered by researchers’ use of different methods to assess socialization, including parent‐report (Moran et al; Raval et al), adolescent‐report (Moran et al; Nelis et al), and observed discussions (Fredrick et al, Moran et al).…”

“…There is some empirical work on NA socialization to support this conjecture (e.g., parents’ supportive responses to NA were linked to less child internalizing for younger children but more internalizing for older children; Mirabile, Oertwig, & Halberstadt, ). From the quartet papers, significant associations between children's age and youth PA regulation and maternal socialization were found with 7–12‐year‐olds (Moran et al, this issue), but the other three articles with adolescent samples did not report associations with age (Fredrick et al, this issue; Nelis et al, this issue; Raval et al, this issue). Research with a wider age range (across childhood and adolescence) may show more developmental changes in youth's PA displays and corresponding patterns of parents’ socialization of youth's PA.…”

“…To recap each article, first, in a longitudinal study, Nelis and colleagues (this issue) found that maternal enhancing was positively predictive of 12–16‐year‐old adolescents’ enhancing PA responses (i.e., savoring or strategies likely to increase PA) and lower depressive symptoms over time. Adolescent depressive symptoms also positively predicted maternal dampening and negatively predicted maternal enhancing, indicating the bidirectional nature of this process.…”

Parental socialization of positive affect, adolescent positive affect regulation, and adolescent girls’ depression in India

“…In another study, mothers’ dampening responses to early adolescents’ PA were associated with adolescents’ NA dysregulation and self‐reported depression (Yap et al, ). Of course, bidirectional influences are important to acknowledge (Nelis, Bastin, Raes, & Bijttebier, in this quartet). Depressed adolescents may elicit more dampening or less enhancement from their parents than non‐depressed youth.…”