Depressive Symptoms and Addictive Behaviors in Young Adults After Childhood Trauma: The Mediating Role of Personality Organization and Despair
There is substantial evidence that traumatic experiences in childhood increase the likelihood of mood pathology and addictive behaviors in adolescence and young adulthood. Furthermore, both forms of psychopathology have been linked to deficiencies in personality organization and a common primary emo...
Saved in:
Published in | Frontiers in psychiatry Vol. 9; p. 318 |
---|---|
Main Authors | , , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
Switzerland
Frontiers Media S.A
16.07.2018
|
Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
Cover
Loading…
Summary: | There is substantial evidence that traumatic experiences in childhood increase the likelihood of mood pathology and addictive behaviors in adolescence and young adulthood. Furthermore, both forms of psychopathology have been linked to deficiencies in personality organization and a common primary emotion core. In this study, we intended to further investigate these interactions by assuming a mediating role of personality organization and despair regarding the relationship between childhood trauma and psychiatric symptom burden later in life.
A total sample of 500 young adults (Age:
= 26;
= 5.51; 63.2% female) were investigated. Structural Equation Modeling was applied in order to investigate the pathways between the latent variables Childhood Trauma, Structural Deficit, Despair (comprised of the primary emotions SEEKING and SADNESS), as well as symptoms of addiction and depression.
The results indicate that the influence of Childhood Trauma on Addictive Behaviors was mediated by Structural Deficit (
< 0.01), whereas its influence on Depressive Symptoms was mediated by Despair (decreased SEEKING and increased SADNESS) (
< 0.01). Furthermore, Addictive Behaviors seemed to be stronger represented in males (
< 0.001). The final model was able to explain 39% of the variance of Addictive Behaviors and 85% of the variance of Depressive Symptoms.
The findings underline the importance of early experiences in the development of adult affective and personality functioning, which is linked to the development of psychiatric disorders. Regarding clinical practice, addiction treatment might focus on the improvement of personality organization, while treatment of depressed patients should primarily emphasize the restructuring of dysfunctional primary emotion dispositions. |
---|---|
Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 Edited by: Luigi Janiri, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Italy This article was submitted to Addictive Disorders, a section of the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry Reviewed by: Adriano Schimmenti, Kore University of Enna, Italy; Domenico De Berardis, Azienda Usl Teramo, Italy |
ISSN: | 1664-0640 1664-0640 |
DOI: | 10.3389/fpsyt.2018.00318 |