Cultural Stressors and the Hopelessness Model of Depressive Symptoms in Latino Adolescents

• Published in: Journal of youth and adolescence Vol. 41; no. 10; pp. 1339 - 1349
• Main Authors: Stein, Gabriela L., Gonzalez, Laura M., Huq, Nadia
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Boston Springer US 01-10-2012; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Acculturation; Adolescent; Adolescent Behavior - ethnology; Adolescents; Attitude to Health - ethnology; Attribution Theory; Behavioral Science and Psychology; Child and School Psychology; Child development; Child psychology; Clinical Psychology; Cognition; Cognitive models; Conflict; Conflicts; Coping; Cultural Characteristics; Cultural Influences; Cultural values; Culture; Depression; Depression (Psychology); Depression - ethnology; Discrimination; Economic Factors; Economics; Educational Development; Empirical Research; English; Ethnic Groups; Female; Health Psychology; Hispanic Americans; Hispanic Americans - psychology; Hispanic Americans - statistics & numerical data; Hispanic culture; Hispanic people; History of Psychology; Humans; Interpersonal Relations; Law and Psychology; Life Style; Male; Measures (Individuals); Mental depression; Mexican Americans; Minority & ethnic groups; Minority Groups; Models, Psychological; Parent Child Relations; Parent Child Relationship; Peer Acceptance; Pessimism; Poverty; Prediction; Psychology; Racial Bias; Resistance (Psychology); Risk; Risk Factors; Self Evaluation (Individuals); Stress; Stress Variables; Symptoms (Individual Disorders); Teenagers; United States; Values; Youth; United States; USA; Depressive symptoms; Discrimination; Latinos
• ISSN: 0047-2891; 1573-6601
• DOI: 10.1007/s10964-012-9765-8

Depressive symptoms in Latino youth have been related to both culturally-universal and culturally-based stressors. However, few studies have examined the unique contributions of culturally-based stressors above and beyond other types of stressors. Moreover, no past studies with Latinos have examined the role of culturally-based stressors within a hopelessness model of depressive symptoms, a cognitive model with the strongest empirical support in adolescence. The current study examined these issues in a sample of 171 Latino adolescents (7th–10th grades; mean age = 14; 46 % male). The Latino adolescents were primarily Mexican–American (78 %) and born in the United States (60 %). Students completed measures during a school period on their experiences of parent–child conflict, economic stress, discrimination from peers, and acculturative stress as well as depressive symptoms and attributional style. The results indicated that culturally-based stressors (e.g., acculturative stress and discrimination) predicted greater depressive symptoms even when controlling for culturally-universal stressors (e.g., parent–child conflict, economic stress). Moreover, a negative attributional style moderated the relationship between culturally-universal stressors and depressive symptoms, but this was not the case for culturally-based stressors. Culturally-based stressors play an important role in depressive symptoms among Latino youth. These stressors predicted greater symptomatology even when controlling for other types of stressors and a negative attributional style. These findings suggest that there may be other cognitive risk factors associated with culturally-based stressors.