Longitudinal links between adolescent social anxiety and depressive symptoms: testing the mediational effects of cybervictimization
File(s)Van Zalk & Van Zalk, 2019.pdf (1.04 MB)
Published version
Author(s)
Van Zalk, Nejra
Van Zalk, Maarten
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
This study focuses on the temporal sequence between social anxiety and depressive symptoms, and whether cybervictimization might mediate these links. We used a longitudinal sample of 501 early adolescents (51.9% girls; Mage = 13.96) followed at three time points. Using a cross-lagged path model in MPlus, we found that social anxiety predicted depressive symptoms over time, but not the other way around. Time-1 depressive symptoms also predicted cybervictimization, but only for boys and not for girls. No mediating effects of cybervictimization emerged; however, Time-2 social anxiety was a significant mediator between Time-1 social anxiety and depressive symptoms, whereas Time-2 depressive symptoms significantly mediated the link between Time-1 social anxiety and Time-3 depressive symptoms. In sum, social anxiety was a strong predictor of depressive symptoms over time but not vice versa-irrespective of cybervictimization.
Date Issued
2019-04-01
Date Acceptance
2018-07-01
Citation
Child Psychiatry and Human Development, 2019, 50 (2), pp.186-197
ISSN
0009-398X
Publisher
Springer (part of Springer Nature)
Start Page
186
End Page
197
Journal / Book Title
Child Psychiatry and Human Development
Volume
50
Issue
2
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
Identifier
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30019222
PII: 10.1007/s10578-018-0829-1
Subjects
Comorbidity
Cybervictimization
Depressive symptoms
Early adolescence
Social anxiety
Publication Status
Published
Coverage Spatial
United States
Date Publish Online
2018-07-17