Low-income fathers are emotionally resilient: A qualitative exploration of paternal emotions across early parenting.

Emotions play an important role in fostering positive parenting and healthy child development. This qualitative study explored the affective experiences of racially diverse US fathers with low income across the prenatal, postnatal, and early childhood periods. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 24 fathers. Interview questions asked about fathers' early parenting experiences that elicit parenting emotions of different valence. Results from thematic analysis demonstrated activation of multiple emotions depending on different proximal and distal experiences. Specific to proximal experiences, fathers reported feeling both excited and anxious about pregnancy and joyful and disappointed at childbirth. Related to distal experiences, fathers reported feeling encouraged by their social support networks that further aid their parenting, but feeling marginalized given systematic barriers (e.g., societal bias, high incarceration rates of Black fathers). Most importantly, fathers' parenting emotions, especially negative ones, led to them resolving to stay involved in their children's lives, gaining a sense of responsibility, and changing behaviors to do right by their children. Fathers resorted to various coping strategies to regulate their negative emotions. Overall, fathers with low income are emotionally resilient. Infant and early childhood health professionals should support fathers' mental health to promote father-child engagement and thus, ultimately, young children's mental health and wellbeing.

Las emociones juegan un papel importante en fomentar una crianza positiva y un saludable desarrollo del niño. Este estudio cualitativo exploró las experiencias afectivas de papás de Estados Unidos de bajos recursos económicos que son racialmente diversos a lo largo de los períodos prenatal, postnatal y la temprana niñez. Se llevaron a cabo entrevistas semiestructuradas con 24 papás. Las preguntas de la entrevista trataban acerca de las tempranas experiencias de crianza de los papás que provocaban emociones de crianza de valencia diferente. Los resultados de análisis temáticos demostraron la activación de múltiples emociones dependiendo de diferentes emociones proximales y distales. Específico a las experiencias proximales, los papás reportaron sentirse tanto emocionados como ansiosos acerca del embarazo y alegres y decepcionados al momento del nacimiento. Con relación a las experiencias distales, los papás reportaron sentirse animados por parte de sus redes de apoyo social que ayudaron en su acercamiento a la crianza y sentirse marginalizados dadas las barreras sistemáticas. De manera más importante, las emociones de crianza de los papás especialmente las negativas, les llevaron a decidir mantenerse involucrados en las vidas de sus niños, adquiriendo un sentido de responsabilidad y cambiando conductas para hacer lo correcto con sus niños. Los papás recurrieron a varias estrategias para regular sus emociones negativas. En general, los papás de bajas entradas económicas son emocionalmente fuertes. Los profesionales de la salud infantil y en la temprana niñez deben apoyar la salud mental de los papás para promover la compenetración papá­niño y a la larga, la salud mental y el bienestar de los niños pequeños.

Childhood Maltreatment and Longitudinal Epigenetic Aging: NIMHD Social Epigenomics Program.

Importance: Child physical and emotional abuse and neglect may affect epigenetic signatures of accelerated aging several years after the exposure. Objective: To examine the longitudinal outcomes of early-childhood and midchildhood exposures to maltreatment on later childhood and adolescent profiles of epigenetic accelerated aging. Design, Setting, and Participants: This cohort study used data from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study (enrolled 1998-2000), a US birth cohort study with available DNA methylation (DNAm) data at ages 9 and 15 years (assayed between 2017 and 2020) and phenotypic data at birth (wave 1), and ages 3 (wave 3), 5 (wave 4), 9 (wave 5), and 15 (wave 6) years. Data were analyzed between June 18 and December 10, 2023. Exposures: Emotional aggression, physical assault, emotional neglect, and physical neglect via the Parent-Child Conflict Tactics Scale at ages 3 and 5 years. Main Outcomes and Measures: Epigenetic accelerated aging (DNAmAA) was measured using 3 machine learning-derived surrogates of aging (GrimAge, PhenoAge, and DunedinPACE) and 2 machine learning-derived surrogates of age (Horvath and PedBE), residualized for age in months. Results: A total of 1971 children (992 [50.3%] male) representative of births in large US cities between 1998 and 2000 were included. Physical assault at age 3 years was positively associated with DNAmAA for PhenoAge (ß = 0.073; 95% CI, 0.019-0.127), and emotional aggression at age 3 years was negatively associated with PhenoAge DNAmAA (ß = -0.107; 95% CI, -0.162 to -0.052). Emotional neglect at age 5 years was positively associated with PhenoAge DNAmAA (ß = 0.051; 95% CI, 0.006-0.097). Cumulative exposure to physical assault between ages 3 and 5 years was positively associated with PhenoAge DNAmAA (ß = 0.063; 95% CI, 0.003-0.123); emotional aggression was negatively associated with PhenoAge DNAmAA (ß = -0.104; 95% CI, -0.165 to -0.043). The association of these measures with age 15 years PhenoAge DNAmAA was almost fully mediated by age 9 years PhenoAge DNAm age acceleration. Similar patterns were found for GrimAge, DunedinPACE, and PhenoAge, but only those for PhenoAge remained after adjustments for multiple comparisons. Conclusions and Relevance: In this cohort study, altered patterns of DNAmAA were sensitive to the type and timing of child maltreatment exposure and appeared to be associated with more proximate biological embedding of stress.

Examining Coping Strategies and Mental Health during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Evidence for the Protective Role of Problem-Focused Coping.

Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, studies documented a marked decline in mental health and well-being when compared with prepandemic levels. This study examined how different coping styles were associated with anxiety, depression, and sleep problems among U.S. adults March-April 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. Data from 535 U.S. adults across three time points were analyzed using longitudinal multilevel logistic and linear regression modeling. Avoidant-emotional coping was associated with greater odds of experiencing anxiety (OR = 1.65, p < .001). Both avoidant- and active-emotional coping were associated with greater odds of experiencing depression (OR = 1.67, p < .001, and OR = 1.09, p = .022, respectively) and sleep problems (b = 0.05, p < .001, and b = 0.01, p = .005, respectively). Alternatively, problem-focused coping was associated with lower odds of depression (OR = 0.86, p < .001). Results converge with previous evidence suggesting the perniciousness of avoidant-emotional coping during the pandemic, but also underscore that problem-focused coping strategies may represent one important source of resilience for adults to adapt despite such challenges.

What was missed in child protection responses during COVID-19? Perceptions of professionals from various countries.

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic increased the likelihood of child maltreatment and made already difficult circumstances for children and their families much worse. This increased the significance of the child protection system's role in responding to child maltreatment and ensuring children's rights, including their right to a safe life without violence. Unfortunately, accumulating evidence has indicated that the rates of child maltreatment increased during the pandemic. OBJECTIVE: The current study sought to identify the gaps within child protection responses in various countries during the COVID-19 pandemic and to discover how we can respond to crises in the future while preserving children's rights, including their right to protection from maltreatment. METHOD: Five focus groups with a total of 47 professionals working with children from various countries were conducted via Zoom and analyzed using a thematic approach. RESULTS: Three main themes were identified: 1) gaps in policies, 2) gaps in practice, and 3) professionals' messages to improve policy and practice. CONCLUSIONS: This study emphasizes what was missed in child protection policy and practice, highlighting the continuous neglect of children's needs and voices within policies, practices and guidelines worldwide during the pandemic. Professionals' recommendations for policy and practice are also discussed.

The remote work of child protection professionals during COVID-19: A scoping review and thematic analysis.

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic created new challenges and barriers for the work of child protection professionals (CPPs) and intensified existing hardships for families and children, increasing the risk of child maltreatment. As new restrictions and precautions were implemented by governments worldwide to stop the virus from spreading, CPPs had to adapt to a new reality of working remotely. However, limited research has investigated how remote work impacted CPPs and child protection work and how CPPs handled this alternative work style. OBJECTIVE: This review aims to address gaps in the research to reveal the creative and effective approaches CPPs developed to overcome the challenges presented by COVID-19, defined as the 'positive legacy' of CPPs, particularly in adapting to remote work challenges. METHOD: This review was conducted using a scoping review, followed by two rounds of thematic analysis. The scoping review was conducted in six languages: Hebrew, Arabic, French, Portuguese, Spanish, and English. RESULTS: The first round of thematic analysis found 18 articles relevant to this review. The second round extracted two main themes: 1) the challenges of remote work and 2) overcoming the challenges of no contact. CONCLUSIONS: The findings of this review may be used to inform future strategies for child protection during a pandemic. They also provide an opportunity to rethink the relationship child protection work has with technology to systematically reform current and future protection policies and practices, including outside of a pandemic.

Experiences and responses of child protection professionals during COVID-19: Lessons learned from professionals around the globe.

BACKGROUND: COVID-19 significantly worsened already challenging circumstances for children and their families and globally increased the likelihood of child maltreatment. This risk heightened the urgency of child protection professionals in preventing child maltreatment and defending children's rights. The vast and growing body of research on protecting children from child maltreatment during COVID-19 has emphasized practitioners' tremendous difficulty in this arena. OBJECTIVE: The current international study sought to identify the experiences and responses of child protection professionals to child maltreatment during COVID-19. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: Five real-time, virtual focus groups were conducted among professionals who work with children from countries around the globe. METHOD: Reflexive thematic analysis was employed to analyze the focus group transcripts. RESULTS: The participants identified their experiences and challenges in performing their role of protecting children. Additionally, they shared context-adapted and innovative responses to child maltreatment, while emphasizing self-care and their mental health. CONCLUSIONS: The results highlighted that child protection was significantly more challenging during the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, they underlined the importance of establishing practices and policies for child protection in crisis times as well as ensuring both children's and professionals' well-being and mental health.

Child protective services and out-of-home Care for Children during COVID-19: A scoping review and thematic analysis.

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic challenged child protection and posed new risks for child maltreatment (CM). Moreover, governmental efforts worldwide prioritized mitigating the spread of the virus over ensuring the welfare and protection of families and children. This neglect caused hardship for many vulnerable children, including those in out-of-home care (OOHC), and challenged the functionality of child protective services (CPS). However, only limited research has investigated the impact of COVID-19 on OOHC and CPS and explored how CPS overcame the challenges of helping children in OOHC. OBJECTIVE: This review aims to address this gap in the research to unveil the 'positive legacy' left by CPS in their work with children in OOHC during COVID-19. METHOD: This review utilized three stages of analysis, including a scoping review followed by two rounds of thematic analysis. The scoping review was carried out in six languages: English, Hebrew, Arabic, French, Portuguese, and Spanish. The first round of thematic analysis found eight relevant articles for this review. The second round of thematic analysis found three themes related to this paper's aim in the context of COVID-19. RESULTS: Three main themes were identified: 1) decision-making and OOHC, 2) difficulties in procedures related to OOHC placement, and 3) handling challenges of OOHC. CONCLUSIONS: The discussion emphasizes the crucial role of preserving children's rights, hearing their voices and needs, and considering their safety and well-being when planning policies and practices to protect them. It also emphasizes society's responsibility to acknowledge contextual factors in child protection.

Material hardship in the postpartum year: Links to child maltreatment.

BACKGROUND: Millions of mothers with young children in the U.S. struggle to afford basic needs. Material hardships such as inadequate food, housing, and medical care increase risk for child maltreatment as mothers face heightened physical and emotional strain. OBJECTIVE: The present study applied a person-centered approach to understand unique subtypes of material hardship experienced by at-risk mothers in the postpartum year, and links from hardship subtypes to subsequent child maltreatment. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: The sample included at-risk mothers who gave birth in one of 20 large American cities 1998-2000 and retained custody of their children at age 1 and 3 (N = 3966). METHOD: Latent class analysis (LCA) identified subtypes of material hardship; mean maltreatment scores were estimated across classes. RESULTS: LCA identified four hardship subtypes with differential risks for maltreatment. Compared to "Stable" mothers, "Cost-Burdened" mothers - who displayed high levels of missed rent and utility payments - were significantly more likely to psychological abuse (χ2 = 5.04, p < 0.05) or neglect (χ2 = 4.46, p < 0.05) their children. "Severely Housing Insecure Mothers" - characterized by elevated rates of doubling up, eviction, and homelessness - were significantly more likely to engage in physical assault (χ2 = 16.25, p < 0.001), psychological aggression (χ2 = 11.15, p < 0.01), and neglect (χ2 = 17.55, p < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: Difficulty maintaining stable and affordable housing is associated with elevated risk of child maltreatment. Efforts to prevent child maltreatment must incorporate access to housing screening and supports, particularly among families with infants.

The global impact of COVID-19 on child protection professionals: A scoping review and thematic analysis.

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic triggered new risks for child maltreatment (CM) and exacerbated existing challenges for families and children, elevating the importance of child protection professionals (CPPs) while also adding barriers to their work. During the pandemic, many CPPs experienced increased workloads, a disrupted work environment, and personal pandemic-related hardships. However, the scope of how COVID-19 impacted CPPs globally, as well as their adopted coping strategies, have not been well explored. OBJECTIVE: This study addresses these gaps in the research by conducting an international scoping review to explore and analyze these topics. METHOD: The scoping review was performed in six languages: English, Hebrew, Arabic, French, Spanish, and Portuguese, across 16 databases. Sixteen manuscripts were included in the final thematic analysis of this review. RESULTS: Two main themes were identified: 1) the impact of COVID-19 on CPPs, and 2) the coping and adaptation strategies employed by CPPs during COVID-19. This review revealed and emphasized the importance of CPPs' resilience during COVID-19, underpinned by the theoretical framework of the social ecology of resilience. CONCLUSIONS: This study highlights the responsibility of social ecologies and organizational structures to create readiness for a rapid response in times of crisis as well as valuable evidence to inform how CPPs, children, and families may be better supported in the event of a future crisis.

Early executive control buffers risk for adolescent psychopathology during the COVID-19 pandemic.

BACKGROUND: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has had a global impact on youth mental health, and there is a critical need for research examining individual factors that contribute to increased psychopathology during the pandemic. The current study explored whether executive control (EC) abilities in early childhood interact with COVID-related stress to attenuate risk for adolescent psychopathology during the first 6 months of the pandemic. METHODS: Participants were 337 youth (49% female) living in a small midwestern city in the United States. Participants completed EC tasks when they were approximately 4.5 years old as part of a longitudinal study investigating cognitive development. At annual laboratory visits during adolescence and before the pandemic, participants (Mage = 14.57) reported on mental health symptoms. In July and August of 2020, participants (Mage = 16.57) reported on COVID-related stress and depression, anxiety, and trauma symptoms. RESULTS: COVID-related stress was associated with increased internalizing problems after controlling for prepandemic symptom levels. Further, the impact of COVID-related stress on adolescent internalizing problems was moderated by preschool EC, with higher levels of EC buffering the effects of COVID-related stress on adolescent internalizing problems. CONCLUSIONS: Findings highlight the importance of promoting EC early in development, as well as screening for EC deficits and implementing targeted intervention strategies across the lifespan to help reduce the impact of stress on adolescent internalizing problems.

Examining the Role of Body Image Instability in Young Adult Women: Conceptualization, Development, and Psychometric Evaluation of the Vacillating Body Image Scale (VBIS).

The current study conceptualized body image instability as a maladaptive tendency to vacillate between different self-perceptions of one's overall body image and developed a corresponding measure to assess body image instability. Results from a series of studies of young adult women demonstrated the validity, reliability, and utility of the Vacillating Body Image Scale (VBIS) as a meaningful measure of body image instability. In Study 1, we found that body image instability, as assessed by the VBIS, represents a unidimensional and reliable construct. In Study 2, we found evidence for both the convergent and discriminant validity of the VBIS in relation to other individual differences measures (i.e., self-concept schema, broad personality factors). In Study 3, the concurrent criterion validity of the VBIS was supported for young adult women in relation to a range of adjustment measures. Finally, in Study 4, we found consistent evidence for the incremental validity of the VBIS in predicting subsequent variations in eating disturbances, even after controlling for global self-esteem and self-concept instability. Overall, our findings offer promising support for our contention that body image instability, as measured by the VBIS, represents an important construct for understanding eating-related disturbances and other health outcomes in young adult women.

Validity of the Frequency of Suicidal Ideation Inventory in Brazilian adults.

We examined the validity of the Brazilian Frequency of Suicidal Ideation Inventory (FSII-Br), an adaptation of the Frequency of Suicidal Ideation Inventory (FSII), in 946 Brazilian undergraduates. Confirmatory factor analysis of the FSII-Br demonstrated a one-factor model accounting for 62.39% of the variance in FSII-Br scores with a good FIT index. Correlation analyses demonstrated that the FSII-Br was positively correlated with both measures of suicide ideation and suicide risk (viz., depressive symptoms, anxious symptoms, and hopelessness), providing construct validity. Thus, the FSII-Br was found to be a promising tool in assessing suicide risk among Brazilian adults.

Beyond the Role of Interpersonal Violence in Predicting Negative Affective Conditions in Adults: An Examination of Hope Components in Chinese College Students.

With the growth of positive psychology during the past two decades, increased research has been focused on identifying human virtues that not only foster well-being but also act as positive processes that mitigate the impact of life adversities. Thus, it is useful to examine how positive processes, such as hope, may impact individuals' psychological adjustment following adversities. This study investigated the relationships among interpersonal violence, hope, as a key human strength, and negative affect conditions in a large sample (N = 737) of Chinese male and female (Nfemale = 409) college students. Participants completed measures assessing prior exposure to interpersonal violence, levels of both hope components (i.e., agency and pathways), negative affect, depressive symptoms, and suicidal ideation. Results from correlational analyses showed that exposure to interpersonal violence was positively and hope was negatively correlated with negative affective conditions. However, hope agency was more strongly correlated with those outcomes than hope pathways. In addition, three separate hierarchical regression analyses indicated that after accounting for demographics (i.e., age and sex) and interpersonal violence, within hope components, only hope agency remained as strong concurrent predictors of negative affective conditions. The present findings in this Chinese sample are consistent with those obtained from Turkey and the United States samples, adding evidence to the more robust role of hope, and hope agency in particular, in predicting negative psychological adjustment associated with interpersonal violence. Efforts made to address the absence of hope agency may be particularly important in future attempts to mitigate negative affective conditions linked to interpersonal violence among Chinese college students.

Beyond Fundamental Dimensions of Mood in Predicting Depressive Symptoms and Suicidal Ideation in Victims of Interpersonal Violence: Examining the Role of Dispositional Optimism in Chinese Females With and Without Experience of Victimization.

The present study tested a prediction model involving affectivity and dispositional optimism as predictors of suicide risk (i.e., depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation) in young adult Chinese females with and without prior interpersonal violence (IPV) victimization (294 nonvictimized and 94 victimized females). Results of hierarchical regression analyses indicated that negative affectivity was a significant predictor of both depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation for Chinese females, regardless of IPV victimization. Beyond affectivity, dispositional optimism was found to further add to the prediction model of depressive symptoms in both groups, but only for suicidal ideation in the IPV victimized group.

Hope as a Process in Understanding Positive Mood and Suicide Protection.

Background: According to the broaden-and-build model of positive mood, positive emotions are believed to broaden cognition resources and build psychological resiliency, to help incur positive psychological outcomes. Aim: We examined hope as a potential mediator of the association between positive mood and suicide protection (viz., life satisfaction and reasons for living) in adults. We hypothesized that positive mood would be associated with greater suicide protection through broadening hope agency and building hope pathways. Method: A sample of 320 college students completed measures of positive emotions, hope, and suicide protection. Results: Results from bootstrapped mediation testing indicated that hope agency, but not hope pathways, partially or fully mediated the relationship between positive mood and suicide protection. Limitations: It is not clear whether these findings are generalizable to a more diverse adult population. Also, it is not possible to rule out alternative causal models involving positive emotions and suicide protection. Conclusion: These findings provide some promising preliminary evidence for how positive emotions might help build hope agency to foster greater suicide protection in adults.

Using social media Reddit data to examine foster families' concerns and needs during COVID-19.

BACKGROUND: COVID-19 is likely to have negatively impacted foster families but few data sources are available to confirm this. OBJECTIVE: The current study used Reddit social media data to examine how foster families are faring in the pandemic. Discussion topics were identified and examined for changes before and after COVID-19. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: Comments were collected from three Reddit online discussion boards dedicated to foster families (N = 11,830). METHODS: We used machine learning techniques, including Latent Dirichlet Allocation, for topic modeling and textual analysis for qualitative coding of the Reddit comments. RESULTS: Results showed that three main topics had both significant quantitative and meaningful qualitative changes before and after COVID-19. There were significant increases in conversation about becoming a foster parent (F = 5.75, p = 0.02) and activities for foster children (F = 10.61, p = 0.001), whereas there was a significant decrease in discussing permanency (F = 9.46, p = 0.003) before and after the onset of COVID-19. Qualitative coding showed that regarding the topic of becoming a parent, excitement over approval of foster care license before COVID-19 shifted to foster families' increased anxieties about delays in their licensing cases after COVID-19. For permanency, content changed from the best interest of the child and reunifications before COVID-19 to concerns over family separations and permanency challenges after COVID-19. Regarding activities for foster children, content related to everyday activities before COVID-19 changed to specific activities foster children and families could do during lockdowns. Results suggest areas child welfare workers may focus on to better support foster families during and after the pandemic.

Parenting activities and the transition to home-based education during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This study reports on parent-child dynamics during initial COVID-19 related school closures, based on cross-sectional analyses of a survey that utilized a convenience sampling approach. Data were collected in April 2020, approximately five weeks after the World Health Organization declared that the Coronavirus was a pandemic. Participants (N = 405) were adults recruited throughout the U.S. This study examines data from parents (69% mothers and 31% fathers) with at least one child 0-12 years of age. The majority were White (71%) and 41% had at least a bachelor's degree. The majority of parents (78%) were educating their child at home due to COVID-19. Most (77.1%) reported use of online tools for at-home education, including educational apps, social media, and school-provided electronic resources. More than one-third (34.7%) of parents said their child's behavior had changed since the pandemic, including being sad, depressed, and lonely. Most parents were spending more time involved in daily caregiving of their children since COVID-19. Two out of every five parents met the PHQ-8 criteria for major depression or severe major depression (40.0%) and the GAD-7 criteria for moderate or severe anxiety (39.9%). Multivariate analyses indicated that, compared to non-depressed parents, parents who met criteria for probable major or severe depression (B = -0.16, 95% CI = [-0.29, -0.02], p = .021) and parenting stress (B = -0.37, 95% CI = [-0.47, -0.27], p < .001) were negatively associated with parents' perceived preparation to educate at home. Compared to parents with minimal or mild anxiety, parents with moderate or severe anxiety reported higher child anxiety scores (B = 0.17, 95% CI = [0.06, 0.28], p = .002). Parenting stress was also positively associated with higher child anxiety scores (B = 0.40, 95% CI = [0.32, 0.48], p < .001). Content analyses of open-ended questions indicated that school closures were a significant disruption, followed by lack of physical activity, and social isolation. Overall, study results suggested that parents' mental health may be an important factor linked to at-home education and child wellbeing during the pandemic.

Coping and Suicide in College Students.

Background: Transitioning to college life in young adulthood can represent a challenging developmental period and college students are at heightened risk for engaging in suicidality. Aims: We aimed to investigate the roles dispositional optimism and coping strategies play in suicide risk (viz., suicidality) and suicide protection (viz., reasons for living) in college students. Method: A sample of 252 American college students were surveyed using anonymous questionnaires and hierarchical regression analyses were conducted to analyze the data. Results: Coping strategies, as a set, played an important role in both suicidality and reasons for living, after controlling for demographic factors (age and sex). When dispositional optimism was entered into the model, it was found to account for a significant amount of additional unique variance in both suicidality and reasons for living, even after accounting for coping. Limitations: It is unknown whether optimism remains meaningful in its association with suicide risk and protection beyond coping in other populations. Conclusion: Effective coping and optimism are associated with decreased suicide risk and increased suicide protection. Our findings point to the consistent role of dispositional optimism, over coping, in both suicide risk and protection.

The stakes of self-worth: Examining contingencies of self-worth to clarify the association between global self-esteem and eating disturbances in college women.

OBJECTIVE: The present study tested a hypothesized mediation model in which the seven contingencies of self-worth proposed by Crocker and Wolfe mediate the association between global self-esteem and eating disturbances in college women. METHOD: This study utilized a sample of 408 college women. Path analysis was used to produce a model in which the association between global self-esteem and eating disturbances was accounted for through contingencies of self-worth. RESULTS: The finalized model indicated that self-worth based on appearance and competition mediated the link between global self-esteem and both drive for thinness and bulimic symptoms. Self-worth based on virtue mediated the link between global self-esteem and bulimic symptoms. CONCLUSION: The present findings clarify facets of self-worth accounting for the association between global self-esteem and eating disturbances in college women, and point to how self-worth based on one's appearance, or the ability to outdo others, is centrally implicated in this relationship.

Optimism and gratitude on suicide risk in Spanish adults: Evidence for doubling up or doubling down?

OBJECTIVE: The present study examines the role of optimism and gratitude as predictors of suicide risk, namely depressive symptoms and suicide ideation. Beyond their expected predictive role, optimism and gratitude were also hypothesized to interact together to predict both suicide risk outcomes. METHODS: A sample of 1,013 Spanish adults (521 females) participated in this study. The average age was 39.63 years old (standard deviation = 16.19; range 16-82). RESULTS: Results indicated that the optimism × gratitude interaction term significantly augmented the prediction of both depressive symptoms and suicide ideation. Specifically, pessimists presented with a higher risk of suicide, but the effect was weaker among those individuals with higher levels of gratitude. Alternatively, optimists with high gratitude showed the highest amount of protection from suicide risk. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings are the first to show how optimism and gratitude might interact as a positive psychological variable to confer greater personal resources in protecting individuals against suicide risk.