The prospective effects of observed neighborhood disorder, stressful life events, and parents’ engagement in inductive reasoning on adolescents’ depressive symptoms were examined using data collected from 777 African American families. Multilevel analyses revealed that stressful life events experienced at age 11 predicted depressive symptoms at age 13. Furthermore, a significant interaction between neighborhood disorder and parents’ engagement in inductive reasoning was found, indicating that parental use of inductive reasoning was a protective factor for depressive symptoms particularly for youths living in highly disordered neighborhoods. The importance of examining correlates of depressive symptoms from a contextual framework, focusing on individuals, families, and neighborhood contexts, is emphasized.
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/carolyn_cutrona/42/
This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in American Journal of Community Psychology. The final authenticated version is available online at DOI: 10.1007/s10464-007-9092-5. Posted with permission.