The Prediction of Depression by the Early Trauma and Maladaptive Schema in 11 - 13 Year-Old Students

Abstract

Background: Depressive disorder spectrum has been shown to be a significant mental health issue for school-age children. Yet little work has been done to investigate the predictive factors correlated with this early form of depression. Objectives: The aim of this study was to determine the predictive role of early trauma and maladaptive schema in dimensions of depression in 11 - 13 year-old students. Materials and Methods: Multi-stage random sampling was used to select 292 school-age children (201 females, 91 males) with mean age 12.33. All subjects were asked to complete children’s depression inventory (CDI), childhood trauma questionnaire (CTQ) and schemas inventory for children (SIC). The analysis of data was done using canonical correlation. Results: Structural coefficients showed that the pattern of high scores in early trauma and maladaptive schema correlate with the pattern of high scores in depression dimensions. Therefore, the findings indicate that the combination of low early trauma and maladaptive schema can probably decrease the likelihood of depression. Conclusions: In general, the findings of this study showed that early trauma and maladaptive schema can predict depression in children and explain a considerable variance of survival index.

Keywords

• depression
• trauma
• schema
• children