Ma Jian-Ping
Department of Psychology, Shandong Normal University, 88 Wenhua Dong Lu, Lixia District, Jinan City, Shandong Province, China.
Child Psychiatry Hum Dev. 2025 Mar 27. doi: 10.1007/s10578-025-01829-z.
Self-esteem and depression are variable and interrelated in children. However, it is unknown how they co-develop in the general child population and how their patterns of co-development may be related to environmental antecedents. The current study utilized a longitudinal dataset of 544 Chinese children ages 9-13 years to: (a) identify longitudinal associations and joint developmental trajectories of self-esteem and depression problems by CLPM, RI-CLPM, and parallel-process growth mixture models, and (b) investigate early environmental antecedents that might explain differentiated co-developmental patterns. We identified a reciprocal model and four subtypes of the dual-factor mental health framework, complete mental health group (37.6%), symptomatic but content group (16.2%), vulnerable group (38.3%), and troubled group (7.9%). Our study highlights the importance of risk factors (relational victimization and father-student conflict) rather than protective factors on the co-development of self-esteem and depression problems. These findings encourage the development of interventions to target children with both self-esteem and depression problems.
自尊和抑郁在儿童中具有变异性且相互关联。然而，它们在一般儿童群体中如何共同发展，以及它们的共同发展模式如何与环境先行因素相关联尚不清楚。本研究利用了一个包含544名9至13岁中国儿童的纵向数据集，以：(a) 通过交叉滞后潜变量增长模型（CLPM）、随机截距交叉滞后潜变量增长模型（RI-CLPM）和平行过程增长混合模型，确定自尊和抑郁问题的纵向关联和联合发展轨迹，以及 (b) 调查可能解释不同共同发展模式的早期环境先行因素。我们确定了一个相互作用模型和双因素心理健康框架的四种亚型，即完全心理健康组（37.6%）、有症状但满足组（16.2%）、脆弱组（38.3%）和困扰组（7.9%）。我们的研究强调了风险因素（关系型受害和父子冲突）而非保护因素对自尊和抑郁问题共同发展的重要性。这些发现促使针对同时存在自尊和抑郁问题的儿童制定干预措施。
