Interdisciplinary Center for Psychiatric Epidemiology, University Medical Center, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.
Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2011 Aug;35(8):1757-70. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2010.10.013. Epub 2010 Oct 30.
Adolescence is characterized by major biological, psychological, and social challenges, as well as by an increase in depression rates. This review focuses on the association between stressful experiences and depression in adolescence, and the possible role of the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal cortex (HPA-)axis in this link. Adolescent girls have a higher probability to develop depressive symptoms than adolescent boys and preadolescents. Increasing evidence indicates that girls' higher risk of depression is partly brought about by an increased sensitivity for stressful life events, particularly interpersonal stressors, which are highly prevalent in adolescent girls. Genetic risk factors for depression, as well as those for stress sensitivity, are often expressed differently in girls and boys. Also environmental adversity tends to affect girls' stress responses more than those of boys. These gender-specific association patterns have been reported for both sensitivity to stressful life events and HPA-axis responses to social stress. Together, the findings suggest that girls are more malleable than boys in response to internal and external influences. This postulated greater malleability may be adaptive in many circumstances, but also brings along risk, such as an increased probability of depression.
青春期的特点是主要的生物、心理和社会挑战，以及抑郁症发病率的增加。这篇综述重点关注了应激体验与青少年抑郁症之间的关系，以及下丘脑-垂体-肾上腺皮质轴（HPA 轴）在这一联系中的可能作用。与青少年男孩和青春期前儿童相比，少女更有可能出现抑郁症状。越来越多的证据表明，女孩患抑郁症的风险较高部分是由于对压力生活事件的敏感性增加所致，特别是人际压力源，这些压力源在少女中非常普遍。抑郁症的遗传风险因素以及对压力敏感性的遗传风险因素，在女孩和男孩中的表达往往不同。此外，环境逆境往往比男孩更能影响女孩的应激反应。这些性别特异性的关联模式既适用于对压力生活事件的敏感性，也适用于对社会压力的 HPA 轴反应。总之，这些研究结果表明，女孩在对内部和外部影响的反应上比男孩更具可塑性。这种推测的更大可塑性在许多情况下可能是适应性的，但也带来了风险，例如增加患抑郁症的概率。
