Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- Part I Introduction: Historical and theoretical roots of developmental psychopathology
- Part II Contributions of the high-risk child paradigm: continuities and changes in adaptation during development
- Part III Competence under adversity: individual and family differences in resilience
- Part IV The challenge of adolescence for developmental psychopathology
- 14 The development of psychopathology in adolescence
- 15 Depressive symptoms in late adolescence: a longitudinal perspective on personality antecedents
- 16 Vulnerability and resilience in the age of eating disorders: risk and protective factors for bulimia nervosa
- 17 Protected or vulnerable: the challenges of AIDS to developmental psychopathology
- Part V Factors in the development of schizophrenia and other severe psychopathology in late adolescence and adulthood
- A closing note: Reflections on the future
- Author index
- Subject index
15 - Depressive symptoms in late adolescence: a longitudinal perspective on personality antecedents
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 August 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Preface
- Part I Introduction: Historical and theoretical roots of developmental psychopathology
- Part II Contributions of the high-risk child paradigm: continuities and changes in adaptation during development
- Part III Competence under adversity: individual and family differences in resilience
- Part IV The challenge of adolescence for developmental psychopathology
- 14 The development of psychopathology in adolescence
- 15 Depressive symptoms in late adolescence: a longitudinal perspective on personality antecedents
- 16 Vulnerability and resilience in the age of eating disorders: risk and protective factors for bulimia nervosa
- 17 Protected or vulnerable: the challenges of AIDS to developmental psychopathology
- Part V Factors in the development of schizophrenia and other severe psychopathology in late adolescence and adulthood
- A closing note: Reflections on the future
- Author index
- Subject index
Summary
We have witnessed, over the last decade or so, growing interest in integrating the developmental and clinical aspects of depression. Researchers have attempted to delineate age-related manifestations of depressive symptoms from early childhood through adolescence and to trace the socioemotional and environmental antecedents of this disorder (Bemporad & Wilson, 1978; Rutter & Garmezy, 1983; Rutter, Izard, & Read, 1986; Sroufe & Rutter, 1984).
This research effort has identified adolescence as a period during which depressive symptoms and moods are especially evident. Of course, recognition of the mood fluctuations of the adolescent is not new; psychoanalysts have traditionally offered this perception (Freud, 1958; Lorand, 1967). Recent empiricism, however, has provided additional insights into the nature of adolescent depression. Following puberty there is a sharp increase in the frequency of depression, most notably among girls, a rise in the occurrence of manic moods, intensification of grief reactions, and greater frequency of suicide attempts (Rutter, 1986; Rutter & Garmezy, 1983). Although depression during early adolescence (age 13–16) may still be manifested via ageconstrained expressions – possibly due to adolescent egocentrism, insufficiently developed time perspective, and limited life experiences (Bemporad & Wilson, 1978; Malmquist, 1971) – depression during late adolescence (age 16–18) is likely to be more truly comparable to the kind of depressive disorders characterizing adults (Weiner, 1975). This development is likely to derive both from an age-related maturation of cognitive structures (i.e., expressions of depression are no longer constrained by cognitive level) and from what has become, over time and living, a sufficient internalization of feelings and experiences.
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- Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1990
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