Knowledge about the role of empathy, emotional self-efficacy, and loneliness on early adolescents' depressive symptoms is scarce. The main aims of the study were to investigate the following: (a) the role of empathy and emotional self-efficacy (additive and interactive) on loneliness and depressive symptoms, taking into account gender differences…

Recent theory and evidence support an integrated affective-cognitive model of adolescent depressive symptoms in which temperament predicts the use of maladaptive cognitive emotion regulation (ER) strategies which, in turn, predict depressive symptoms. We concurrently and prospectively investigated whether two cognitive ER strategies (dampening and…

Although the assertion that marital hostility relates to higher levels of youth adjustment difficulties has been well established, few studies have examined cooperative marital conflict in relation to youth behavior problems. This study examined the main and moderating effects of cooperative marital conflict on youth behavior problems in a sample…

The present study examined whether emotional abuse and neglect differentially predicted decreases in emotional clarity, and whether emotional clarity, in turn, predicted increases in depressive symptoms. Participants included 204 early adolescents (52% African American; 54% female; M age = 12.85 years) who completed four assessments with measures…

This study examined how social support seeking and rumination interacted to predict depression and anxiety symptoms 6 months later in early adolescents (N = 118; 11-14 years at baseline). We expected social support seeking would be more helpful for adolescents engaging in low rather than high levels of rumination. Adolescents self-reported on all…

Children with low socioeconomic status and ethnic minorities experience disproportionate risk of elevated depressive symptoms. This study examines the effects of risk/protective factors for depressive symptoms among multiethnic urban preadolescents. Eighth graders (N = 463; 34% African American, 29% Hispanic, 17% White, and 20% Other/Mixed; 23%…

Obesity continues to plague U.S. school-age populations. A number of individual/structural circumstances have been identified as increasing the risk of poor health among children. The article's aim is to examine some of these circumstances and their relationship to students being overweight/obese, while highlighting resource variables as potential…