Social support, self-esteem and depression
- 1 May 1986
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Cambridge University Press (CUP) in Psychological Medicine
- Vol. 16 (4), 813-831
- https://doi.org/10.1017/s0033291700011831
Abstract
A prospective study of 400 largely working-class women with children living at home has used measures of self-esteem and ‘social support’ to predict the risk of depression in the following year once a stressor had occurred. Actual support received at the time of any crisis in the follow-up year was also measured. Self-esteem was correlated quite highly with some of the measures of support.A core tie was defined as a husband, lover or someone named as very close at first contact. Negative evaluation of self (i.e. low self-esteem), and various indices of lack of support from a core tie at the first interview, were associated with a greatly increased risk of subsequent depression once stressor occurred. Lack of support from a core tie at the time of the crisis was particularly highly associated with an increased risk. There was also a high risk among those who were ‘let down’ - that is, for those who did not receive the support which they might have expected in terms of the first interview material. It is concluded that it is essential for prospective enquiries to take account of the actual mobilization of support in the follow-up period.Keywords
This publication has 42 references indexed in Scilit:
- Depression: Distress or Disease? Some Epidemiological ConsiderationsThe British Journal of Psychiatry, 1985
- Coping with a threat to life: A longitudinal study of self‐concept, social support, and psychological distressAmerican Journal of Community Psychology, 1984
- Social Factors and Affective Disorder: An Investigation of Brown and Harris's ModelThe British Journal of Psychiatry, 1983
- Fall-off in the reporting of life eventsSocial psychiatry. Sozialpsychiatrie. Psychiatrie sociale, 1982
- Social support, residual adversity and depressive outcomeSocial psychiatry. Sozialpsychiatrie. Psychiatrie sociale, 1980
- Interactions in contingency tables: a brief discussion of alternative definitionsPsychological Medicine, 1979
- Social origins of depression: a replyPsychological Medicine, 1978
- An evaluation of an interview assessment of marriagePsychological Medicine, 1977
- Further studies on interviewer training and inter-rater reliability of the Present State Examination (PSE)Psychological Medicine, 1977
- The reliability and validity of measures of family life and relationships in families containing a psychiatric patientSocial psychiatry. Sozialpsychiatrie. Psychiatrie sociale, 1966