When talking goes awry: association between co-rumination and trait anxiety, test anxiety, and anxiety sensitivity in early and late adolescents.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Friends are major sources of social support for adolescents. This support may sometimes lead to co-rumination when the problem is discussed exhaustively with a focus on negative feelings. Co-rumination has been associated with some forms of anxiety, including clinical symptoms. Further studies are needed to investigate whether this association extends to additional and non-clinical forms of anxiety in youth. This study aimed to explore the relationship between co-rumination and trait anxiety, test anxiety, and anxiety sensitivity using secondary data. DESIGN AND METHODS: In this 2019 cross-sectional study, 1204 (59% girls) Canadian 6th-grade early adolescents (ages 11-12) and 11th-grade late adolescents (ages 16-17) completed self-report questionnaires measuring co-rumination, trait anxiety, test anxiety, and anxiety sensitivity. RESULTS: Co-rumination was associated with anxiety sensitivity in early adolescents and with trait anxiety, test anxiety, and anxiety sensitivity in late adolescents. CONCLUSIONS: Developmental factors may play a role in the association between co-rumination and different forms of anxiety. Anxiety sensitivity may appear alongside co-rumination in early adolescence and may broaden to trait and test anxiety in late adolescence. These results extend our understanding of the relationship between co-rumination and anxiety, as well as generate hypotheses for future longitudinal studies.

Learning to embrace one's stress: the selective effects of short videos on youth's stress mindsets.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Stress is not inherently negative. As youth will inevitably experience stress when facing the various challenges of adolescence, they can benefit from developing a stress-can-be-enhancing mindset rather than learning to fear their stress responses and avoid taking on challenges. We aimed to verify whether a rapid intervention improved stress mindsets and diminished perceived stress and anxiety sensitivity in adolescents. DESIGN AND METHODS: An online experimental design randomly exposed 233 Canadian youths aged 14-17 (83% female) to four videos of the Stress N' Go intervention (how to embrace stress) or to control condition videos (brain facts). Validated questionnaires assessing stress mindsets, perceived stress, and anxiety sensitivity were administered pre- and post-intervention, followed by open-ended questions. RESULTS: The intervention content successfully instilled a stress-can-be-enhancing mindset compared to the control condition. Although Bayes factor analyses showed no main differences in perceived stress or anxiety sensitivity between conditions, a thematic analysis revealed that the intervention helped participants to live better with their stress. CONCLUSIONS: Overall, these results suggest that our intervention can rapidly modify stress mindsets in youth. Future studies are needed to determine whether modifying stress mindsets is sufficient to alter anxiety sensitivity in certain adolescents and contexts.

Anxiety in the Classroom: Only Girls' Anxiety Is Related to Same-Sex Peers' Anxiety.

Many teens report experiencing anxiety in school, which can negatively impact their well-being. Considering that adolescents tend to adopt the same behaviors as their classmates with whom they spend, on average, 923 h every year, the current exploratory study (1) assessed whether an association exists between a student's state anxiety score and his/her classmates' average trait anxiety scores and (2) examined whether this association differed between boys and girls, as well as between elementary school and high school students. During two consecutive school years, 1044 Canadian students (59% girls) from six elementary schools (aged 10−12) and seven high schools (aged 15−17) completed the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory for Children. Multilevel analyses revealed a same-sex peer effect of classmates' anxiety in girls only (ß = 0.40, p < 0.001). This effect was similar for elementary and high school girls (ß = 0.07, p = 0.27). Interestingly, no association was found for boys, same-sex peers (ß = 0.11, p = 0.25), or opposite-sex peers (ß = −0.01, p = 1.00). Our results suggest that factors related to sex may reinforce anxiety in school settings. Future studies should confirm these results and explore the mechanisms involved in this sex-specific difference.

Using latent profile analysis to uncover the combined role of anxiety sensitivity and test anxiety in students' state anxiety.

Background: Studies report a growing tendency for students to experience state anxiety in schools. However, the combination of individual susceptibilities likely to trigger students' anxious states remains unclear. Aims: This study examined whether distinct profiles of students emerge regarding their susceptibility to anxiety sensitivity and/or test anxiety and evaluated whether students' profile predicted anxious states. We also verified whether susceptibility profiles varied across gender, school level, and school type. Sample and methods: In total, 1,404 Canadian students in Grades 5 and 10 (589 boys; M age = 15.2, SD = 2.1) from 13 public and private schools completed self-reported measures of state/trait anxiety, anxiety sensitivity, and test anxiety. Results: Latent profile analyses identified four susceptibility profiles: (1) Double-susceptibility: highest anxiety sensitivity and test anxiety scores; (2) Unique-susceptibility to test anxiety: high test anxiety score and low anxiety sensitivity score; (3) Unique-susceptibility to anxiety sensitivity: high anxiety sensitivity score and low test anxiety score; and (4) No-susceptibility: lowest anxiety sensitivity and test anxiety scores. The profiles comprised 12, 9, 6, and 73% of the sample, respectively, and their membership varied across gender and school type, but not across school levels. A linear mixed-effect model showed that state anxiety varied significantly between profiles, where the Double-susceptibility profile predicted the highest state anxiety scores, followed by the two Unique-susceptibility profiles (indifferently), and the No-susceptibility profile. Conclusion: Beyond their theoretical contribution to the state-trait anxiety literature, these findings suggest that selective interventions designed more specifically for students with the Double-susceptibility profile may be worthwhile. Results also highlight the high proportion of students with the No-susceptibility profile and shed light on the reassuring portrait regarding students' anxiety.