The Small-school Friendship Dynamics of Adolescent Depressive Symptoms

Abstract

Adolescence is a time when depressive symptoms and friendships both intensify. We ask whether friendships change in response to depressive symptoms, whether individual distress is influenced by friends’ distress, and whether these processes vary by gender. To answer these questions we use longitudinal Simulation Investigation for Empirical Network Analysis (SIENA) models to study how changes in friendships and depressive symptoms intertwine with each other among all adolescents, boy-only, and female-only networks in seven smaller K-12th grade Add Health schools. Findings indicate that distressed youth are more likely to be socially excluded, though depressive symptoms are also a basis for friendship formation. Moreover, friends influence each other’s mood levels. These processes differ for boys and girls, however, such that distressed girls are more likely to face exclusion and distressed boys are more likely to befriend and subsequently influence each other. Differences in these processes have implications for intervention efforts since the joint selectivity-influence mechanisms may undercut intervention efforts.

A Dynamic Model of Adolescent Friendship Networks, Parental Influences, and Smoking

“…We created two samples: the first is the second largest school ( n = 976), referred to as “Jefferson High” a rural predominantly White school, see Bearman et al (2004). The second sample consisted of twelve small schools (n = 1,284), each with fewer than 200 students enrolled see (Cheadle and Goosby 2012; Cheadle and Schwadel 2012). The decision to create the two samples was based on the fact that the Jefferson High sample may have a different macro setting than the small schools, and moreover, its large size would statistically overwhelm the estimates for the small schools.…”

Maternal and Peer Regulation of Adolescent Emotion: Associations with Depressive Symptoms

“…Adolescents typically disclose more personal information to peers than parents and consequently peers play a critical role in emotion socialization (Larson and Richards 1991;Rose 2002;Smetana et al 2006). Peers typically respond supportively to expressed emotions (Cheadle and Goosby 2012;Klimes-Dougan et al 2014). In addition, adolescents modify the expression of their emotions in accordance with the anticipated responses from their peers, striving to adhere to socially-accepted display rules (Zeman and Shipman 1997).…”

“…There is the possibility of selection effects with respect to the sample. Adolescents with similar characteristics (e.g., depressive symptoms) tend to become friends, and adolescents with depressive symptoms also tend to have mothers with depressive symptoms (Cheadle and Goosby 2012;Hammen 2009). It is possible that the interpersonal dynamics related to adolescent depressive symptoms observed in the current study also vary as a function of the depressive symptoms of adolescents' close relationship partners.…”

“…Although peers are generally a source of supportive emotion socialization, peer emotion socialization can also play a role in the development of emotion dysregulation and depressive symptoms (Cheadle and Goosby 2012;Rose 2002). For example, friendships tend to form between adolescents with similar characteristics (i.e., selection effects), and those characteristics can become more exaggerated over time in the context of that friendship (i.e., socialization effects; Cheadle and Goosby 2012).…”

Perceived discrimination and markers of cardiovascular risk among low‐income African American youth

“…Adolescence is a particularly important period to examine changing health, as it is a time of social expansion when youth reshape and expand their social networks (e.g., Cheadle and Goosby 2012). Moreover, youth appear to be strongly reactive to social conditions as a result of neurobiological development (Steinberg 2008).…”