Trajectories of Interpersonal and Noninterpersonal Episodic Stress Across Childhood and Adolescence in Boys and Girls

• In Event: Adolescent Depression: Integrating Research on Risk and Prevention to Advance the Field

Abstract

A wealth of literature has documented the deleterious effects of stress on a wide array of outcomes across the lifespan. Stress may be particularly impactful when experienced during childhood and adolescence, as early life stress predisposes youth to experience various forms of psychopathology both concurrently and later in life. Stress is a potent risk factor for both depression and anxiety in youth, and evidence also indicates that youth who experience depression and anxiety are at heightened risk for experiencing increased stress. Understanding how trajectories of stress unfold across childhood and adolescence represents an important research endeavor to prevent the onset of depression and anxiety in youth, as well as an important target for intervention to interrupt cycles of depression and anxiety. However, limited research has comprehensively mapped trajectories of different domains of stress across this critical period of development, and existing evidence is equivocal regarding their patterns of growth.

This study examined the overall trajectory of episodic stress, as well as the trajectory of interpersonal and noninterpersonal episodic stress, in a community sample of 680 youth from a multi-site longitudinal study. Youth were recruited from the Denver and central New Jersey areas in 3rd, 6th and 9th grade cohorts (Mage=11.8, SD=2.4; 55% girls) in an accelerated longitudinal cohort design. Adolescents completed the UCLA Youth Life Stress Interview, a gold-standard interview measure of episodic stress, every 6 months over a follow-up period of 3 years.

The trajectories of total, interpersonal, and noninterpersonal stress were analyzed with latent growth curve modeling (see Table 1). Given the contradictory nature of existing work describing stress trajectories in youth, we did not make a priori hypotheses regarding the shape of growth of stress in any domain. The overall trajectory of stress was best described by a model with both a linear and quadratic slope (linear slope: B=-0.65, p<.001; quadratic slope: B=0.09, p<.001). Likewise, the trajectory of interpersonal stress was best described by a model with both a linear and quadratic slope (linear slope: B=-0.75, p<.001; quadratic slope: B=0.09, p<.001). Youth initially decreased in their levels of overall stress, as well as in their levels of interpersonal stress, before gradually beginning to increase over time (see Figure 1). The trajectory of noninterpersonal stress was linear (B=0.09, p<.001). Youth consistently increased in their levels of noninterpersonal stress from childhood into adolescence (see Figure 1).

Results indicate that the trajectories of stress across development differ by domain, which points to the need to assess and monitor interpersonal and noninterpersonal stress separately in research and clinical work. However, all forms of stress increased from late childhood to adolescence. In future work, we plan to examine associations of trajectories of interpersonal and noninterpersonal episodic stress with co-occurring trajectories of depression and anxiety, to elucidate how trajectories of stress are differentially associated with trajectories of internalizing psychopathology in boys and girls.

Authors

• Erin Long, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
  Presenting Author

• Jami Young, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
  Non-Presenting Author

• Benjamin Hankin, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
  Non-Presenting Author