Pachucki Mark C, Ozer Emily J, Barrat Alain, Cattuto Ciro
Mongan Institute for Health Policy (Massachusetts General Hospital), General Academic Pediatrics (Massachusetts General Hospital for Children), Harvard Medical School, 50 Staniford Street, 9th Floor, Boston, MA 02114, USA.
University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health, Department of Community Health and Human Development, USA.
Soc Sci Med. 2015 Jan;125:40-50. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2014.04.015. Epub 2014 Apr 15.
How are social interaction dynamics associated with mental health during early stages of adolescence? The goal of this study is to objectively measure social interactions and evaluate the roles that multiple aspects of the social environment--such as physical activity and food choice--may jointly play in shaping the structure of children's relationships and their mental health. The data in this study are drawn from a longitudinal network-behavior study conducted in 2012 at a private K-8 school in an urban setting in California. We recruited a highly complete network sample of sixth-graders (n = 40, 91% of grade, mean age = 12.3), and examined how two measures of distressed mental health (self-esteem and depressive symptoms) are positionally distributed in an early adolescent interaction network. We ascertained how distressed mental health shapes the structure of relationships over a three-month period, adjusting for relevant dimensions of the social environment. Cross-sectional analyses of interaction networks revealed that self-esteem and depressive symptoms are differentially stratified by gender. Specifically, girls with more depressive symptoms have interactions consistent with social inhibition, while boys' interactions suggest robustness to depressive symptoms. Girls higher in self-esteem tended towards greater sociability. Longitudinal network behavior models indicate that gender similarity and perceived popularity are influential in the formation of social ties. Greater school connectedness predicts the development of self-esteem, though social ties contribute to more self-esteem improvement among students who identify as European-American. Cross-sectional evidence shows associations between distressed mental health and students' network peers. However, there is no evidence that connected students' mental health status becomes more similar in their over time because of their network interactions. These findings suggest that mental health during early adolescence may be less subject to mechanisms of social influence than network research in even slightly older adolescents currently indicates.
在青春期早期，社会互动动态与心理健康是如何关联的？本研究的目的是客观地衡量社会互动，并评估社会环境的多个方面（如体育活动和食物选择）在塑造儿童人际关系结构及其心理健康方面可能共同发挥的作用。本研究中的数据来自2012年在加利福尼亚州一个城市环境中的一所私立K-8学校进行的一项纵向网络行为研究。我们招募了一个高度完整的六年级学生网络样本（n = 40，占年级人数的91%，平均年龄 = 12.3岁），并研究了两种心理健康困扰指标（自尊和抑郁症状）在青少年早期互动网络中的位置分布情况。我们确定了心理健康困扰在三个月的时间里如何塑造人际关系结构，并对社会环境的相关维度进行了调整。互动网络的横断面分析显示，自尊和抑郁症状在性别上存在差异分层。具体而言，抑郁症状较多的女孩的互动表现出与社交抑制一致的特征，而男孩的互动则表明对抑郁症状具有较强的耐受性。自尊较高的女孩往往更善于社交。纵向网络行为模型表明，性别相似性和感知受欢迎程度对社会关系的形成有影响。更高的学校归属感预示着自尊的发展，尽管社会关系对那些认同为欧裔美国人的学生的自尊提升作用更大。横断面证据显示了心理健康困扰与学生网络同伴之间的关联。然而，没有证据表明有联系的学生的心理健康状况会因为他们的网络互动而随着时间的推移变得更加相似。这些发现表明，与目前针对稍大一些青少年的网络研究相比，青春期早期的心理健康可能较少受到社会影响机制的作用。
