Role of Dysfunctional Attitudes in the Association Between Discrimination and Adolescents' Mental and Physical Health.

Our study is based on Beck's cognitive stress-vulnerability theory of depression and research on (a) disparities in elevated blood pressure between adolescents from minority and majority backgrounds, (b) the effects of perceived everyday discrimination (PED) on depression and elevated blood pressure, and (c) the associations between depression and cardiovascular diseases. The purpose of our study is to integrate Beck's model and the different research lines by examining the associations of the stressor PED and depressive symptoms with blood pressure through the cognitive vulnerability of dysfunctional attitudes in adolescents. In our cross-sectional study, 97 adolescents (40% female) aged 13 to 15 (M = 14.15, SD = .53) who identified as Black (47.5%), white (47.5%), and mixed race (5%) completed self-reports of PED, dysfunctional attitudes, and depressive symptoms and had their blood pressure measured. We used the PROCESS command tool for SPSS to compute OLS regressions and direct, indirect, and total effects of PED, dysfunctional attitudes, and depressive symptoms on blood pressure. As predicted, our analyses revealed that PED predicts dysfunctional attitudes and depressive symptoms, dysfunctional attitudes predict marginally significant depressive symptoms and significantly systolic blood pressure. Our findings highlight the relevance of PED and dysfunctional attitudes for adolescents mental (i.e., depressive symptoms) and physical health (i.e., blood pressure). If this pattern is replicated, systemic interventions to reduce PED and individual interventions to address dysfunctional attitudes in adolescents could be promising to improve both mental (i.e., depressive symptoms) and physical health (i.e., BP).

Relation Between the Negative Cognitive Triad, Perceived Everyday Discrimination, Depressive Symptoms, and TNF-⍺ in Adolescents.

Our study is guided by Beck's cognitive stress-vulnerability model of depression. We examined the associations between perceived everyday discrimination (PED) and TNF-⍺, an inflammatory biomarker associated with risk for severe illness, through the negative cognitive triad (NCT; negative thoughts about the self, world, and future) and depressive symptoms in adolescents. We utilized a sample of 99 adolescents (36.4% female; ages 13-16, M = 14.10, SD = 0.52) in our cross-sectional study. We used PROCESS and AMOS to compute regressions and direct, indirect, and total effects of PED, NCT aspects and depressive symptoms on TNF-⍺. Negative views of the self and world mediated between PED and depressive symptoms and that negative views of the self and future mediated between PED and TNF-⍺. In conclusion, Beck's theory can be expanded to physical health providing directions for addressing mental and physical health simultaneously by restructuring adolescents' negative view of the self.

Temporal Directionality Between Teaching Behavior and Affect in High School Students.

The associations between teaching behaviors and students' affect are examined in cross-sectional studies in younger samples, but the temporal direction of these associations in high school students is unknown. In this longitudinal study, adolescents (N = 188; 88.8% White; 69.7% female) completed instruments to measure teaching behaviors and adolescents' negative (e.g., cheerful) and positive affect (e.g., ashamed) twice, four months apart. Adolescents' negative affect predicted future negative teaching behavior and negative teaching behavior marginally predicted adolescents' future negative affect. Positive affect predicted future socio-emotional teaching behavior and vice versa. The findings provide insight into which teaching behaviors impact students' affect and the impact that students' mental health has on teaching behavior, an area of study that has received limited attention.