Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, UK.
Department of Mental Health, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria.
J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2023 Nov;64(11):1569-1582. doi: 10.1111/jcpp.13847. Epub 2023 Jun 6.
Emotional symptoms, such as anxiety and depressive symptoms, are common during adolescence, often persist over time, and can precede the emergence of severe anxiety and depressive disorders. Studies suggest that a vicious cycle of reciprocal influences between emotional symptoms and interpersonal difficulties may explain why some adolescents suffer from persisting emotional symptoms. However, the role of different types of interpersonal difficulties, such as social isolation and peer victimisation, in these reciprocal associations is still unclear. In addition, the lack of longitudinal twin studies conducted on emotional symptoms during adolescence means that the genetic and environmental contributions to these relationships during adolescence remain unknown.
Participants (N = 15,869) from the Twins Early Development Study completed self-reports of emotional symptoms, social isolation and peer victimisation at 12, 16 and 21 years old. A phenotypic cross-lagged model examined reciprocal associations between variables over time, and a genetic extension of this model examined the aetiology of the relationships between variables at each timepoint.
First, emotional symptoms were reciprocally and independently associated with both social isolation and peer victimisation over time, indicating that different forms of interpersonal difficulties uniquely contributed to emotional symptoms during adolescence and vice versa. Second, early peer victimisation predicted later emotional symptoms via social isolation in mid-adolescence, indicating that social isolation may constitute an intermediate pathway through which peer victimisation predicts longer-term emotional symptoms. Finally, individual differences in emotional symptoms were mostly accounted for by non-shared environmental factors at each timepoint, and both gene-environment and individual-specific environmental mechanisms were involved in the relationships between emotional symptoms and interpersonal difficulties.
Our study highlights the necessity to intervene early in adolescence to prevent the escalation of emotional symptoms over time and to consider social isolation and peer victimisation as important risk factors for the long-term persistence of emotional symptoms.
情绪症状，如焦虑和抑郁症状，在青春期很常见，往往会随着时间的推移而持续存在，并可能先于严重的焦虑和抑郁障碍出现。研究表明，情绪症状和人际困难之间相互影响的恶性循环可能解释了为什么一些青少年会持续出现情绪症状。然而，不同类型的人际困难，如社交孤立和同伴受害，在这些相互关联中的作用仍不清楚。此外，由于缺乏在青春期进行的关于情绪症状的纵向双胞胎研究，因此尚不清楚遗传和环境因素对这些关系的贡献。
来自双胞胎早期发展研究的参与者（N=15869）在 12、16 和 21 岁时完成了情绪症状、社交孤立和同伴受害的自我报告。表型交叉滞后模型考察了变量随时间的相互关联，而该模型的遗传扩展则考察了每个时间点变量之间关系的病因。
首先，情绪症状与社交孤立和同伴受害在时间上是相互独立的，这表明不同形式的人际困难在青春期期间对情绪症状有独特的影响，反之亦然。其次，早期的同伴受害通过青少年中期的社交孤立预测后期的情绪症状，这表明社交孤立可能构成了同伴受害预测长期情绪症状的一个中间途径。最后，情绪症状的个体差异在每个时间点主要归因于非共享环境因素，并且情绪症状和人际困难之间的关系涉及基因-环境和个体特异性环境机制。
我们的研究强调了在青春期早期进行干预的必要性，以防止情绪症状随时间的升级，并将社交孤立和同伴受害视为情绪症状长期持续存在的重要风险因素。
