1. Objectifs

Intentions :
« Depression increases in adolescence and reaches its highest rate in adulthood. Identifying processes operative developmentally prior to the increase is essential to understanding the causes. This research includes two studies in which processes linking adolescents’ insecure attachment to parents to psychological distress are examined. The first study examined the association of insecure attachment to parents with depressive symptoms among early adolescents […] and assessed the mediating roles of attributions and self-esteem. […]
The second study investigated the role of attributional processes to stressful interpersonal events as a process linking insecure attachment and psychological distress among early adolescents […] and young adults […]. » (p. iii)

2. Méthode

Échantillon/Matériau :
Étude 1 : « Participants included 140 seventh-grade and eighth-grade students (87 girls), ages 12-15 years (M=12.65; SD=.70). » (p. 31)
Étude 2 : « Early adolescents participants were 164 seventh-grade and eighth-grade students (101 girls), ages 12-15 (M=12.74; SD=.76), attending an English language high school in Montreal, Quebec. […] Young adult participants were 132 undergraduate students (66 men, 66 women), ages 18-35 (M=24.4; SD=3.93), recruited using posters and sign-up tables placed throughout and English-language University in Montreal […]. » (p. 75)

Instruments :
Étude 1 :
- Adolescent Relationship Scale Questionnaire (ARSQ; Scharfe, 1997);
- The Children Attributional Style Questionnaire-Revised (CASQ-R; Kaslow & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1991);
- Self-Description Questionnaire, General Self-Esteem (GSE Scale (SDQ-II; Masch, 1990);
-The Children’s Depression Inventory (CDI; Kovacs, 1985);
- Social Desirability Scale (SDSl Strahan & Gerbasi, 1972).
Étude 2:
- Relationship Scales Questionnaire (RSQ; Bartholomew, 1990);
- Adolescent Relationship Scale Questionnaire (ARSQ; Scharfe, 1997);
- Social Desirability Scale (SDSl Strahan & Gerbasi, 1972);
- Vignettes of Stressful Situations (Schneider, Eschman & Zuccolotto, 2002).

Types de traitement des données :
Analyse statistique

3. Résumé

« [Results from study 1 show that] adolescents more anxiously attached to both mother and father reported most depressive symptoms. Anxious attachment to mother was associated with depression for adolescent girls only, and maladaptive attributions to negative events partially mediated to association. For girls, self-esteem also mediated between anxious attachment to mother and depression. […]
[Results from study 2 show that] more anxious attachment to mother was associated with higher dysphoria whereas more avoidant attachment to mother was associated with lower dysphoria. Negative attributions mediated between anxious attachment to mother and dysphoria. Negative attributions were more strongly associated with psychological distress for young adults than for adolescents, and thus, attributions to interpersonal stressors mediated more strongly between attachment and dysphoria at the older age.
In conclusion, results of both studies support cognitive models of depression and highlight the importance of quality of attachment to mother in adolescence, in particular attachment anxiety. Attributional processes are indicated as one pathway from anxious attachment to mother to psychological distress for girls in study 1 and for both boys and girls in study 2, a pathway that the results of study 2 suggest is stronger at older ages. Study 1 found self-esteem as another pathway for adolescent girls. » (pp. iii-iv)