A MULTIPLE LEVELS OF ANALYSIS EXAMINATION OF THE PERFORMANCE GOAL ORIENTATION MODEL OF DEPRESSION VULNERABILITY IN PREADOLESCENT BOYS AND GIRLS
Open Access
- Author:
- Bendezu, Jason
- Graduate Program:
- Psychology
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- August 15, 2018
- Committee Members:
- Martha Ellen Wadsworth, Dissertation Advisor/Co-Advisor
Martha Ellen Wadsworth, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
Jose Angel Soto, Committee Member
Karen Gasper, Committee Member
Sy-Miin Chow, Outside Member - Keywords:
- performance goal orientation
coping
attachment
cortisol
alpha-amylase
skin conductance level
stress - Abstract:
- The current study examined Dykman’s (1998) performance goal orientation model of depression vulnerability at multiple levels of analysis (i.e., self-report, observed behavior, physiologic) in a community sample of preadolescent boys and girls (N=121, Mage=10.60 years, 51.6% male). Children provided self-reports of their performance goal orientation (i.e., demonstrating competence to others as motivational reasoning for wanting to achieve) as well as experience of depressive symptomatology in the past year. Children’s observed behavioral (i.e., task persistence) and physiologic (i.e., salivary cortisol, alpha amylase, skin conductance level) responses to a laboratory-based, achievement related stressor (Trier Social Stress Test; TSST) and one of two randomly assigned coping conditions (i.e., distraction, avoidance) were also assessed. Children also provided self-reports of their attachment security (i.e., perceptions of their caregiver as responsive and available in times of need) to gauge whether secure attachment ideations might explain individual differences in performance goal related risk for depression. Significant performance goal orientation to self-reported depressive symptomatology associations emerged as anticipated and these associations were statistically nonsignificant in the context of secure attachment. Interactive performance goal orientation by attachment security effects also emerged when predicting observed behavioral TSST persistence, though the direction of these effects were opposite what was expected. Children’s performance goal orientation also significantly predicted physiologic (i.e., salivary cortisol, skin conductance level) responses to the TSST, effects that varied by attachment security and coping condition. The current study comprises the most comprehensive test of Dykman’s model, illustrating a complex matrix of associations over multiple levels of analysis that unpacks several integrative psychobiological relationships linking performance goal orientation to youth risk for depression.