This study investigated the relationship between life events and depression and the mediating role of social support and the moderating effect of cognitive styles among Chinese adolescents and children. The results show that social support has a partial mediating effect on the relationship between life events and depression in children and adolescents, and cognitive styles can not only moderate the relationship between life events and social support, but also the relationship between social support and depressive symptoms. This will help us further understand the mechanism of the relationship between life events and depression, and help the government and relevant authorities to improve the mental health status of children and adolescents.
The study first examined the relationship between life events and depression in children and adolescents. When children and adolescents experienced more negative stressful life events, they showed higher levels of depression. This is also consistent with previous findings (Stikkelbroek et al., 2016; Guang et al., 2017). In the current educational environment in China, a heavy burden falls on children and teenagers. In addition, they will encounter many key stages in their growth process, and stressful life events from various aspects of life will have a great impact on their mental health (Aliri et al., 2018).
After identifying the relationship between life events and depression, we further validated the mediating role of social support in the relationship between life events and depression in children and adolescents. This is consistent with previous findings about the mediating role of social support in adolescents’ life events and depression (Liu et al., 2020). Social support has long been used as a protective factor for depression, and in recent years many studies have examined the role of social support in depression, but these studies often consider it as a moderating factor and finding that social support significantly reduces depression in children and adolescents (Cho & Bulgar, 2021; Maulik et al., 2010). However, the mediating role of social support in depression can not be ignored. Studies have shown that life events can change adolescents' attachment style (Fraley et al., 2020), and adolescents' attachment style is directly related to social support (Khodarahimi et al., 2016). Compared with normal attachment individuals, individuals with avoidant attachment want to contact others less, resulting in less perceived social support. These studies also further support the possibility that social support plays a mediating role in life events and depression. Our results also demonstrate that when children and adolescents experience more life events, they experience less social support, which in turn increases the onset of depression in the absence of this protective factor. The results demonstrate once again the importance of social support in the development of children and adolescents. Social support includes parents, teachers, classmates, friends and other important relationships with children, among which family education and school education are the most important. The results show that the active care and support of parents and teachers is extremely important in the health of children and adolescents. Many children choose to face the pressure in life alone, which will worsen their mental health in the long run. Social support, as a protective factor, can improve this relationship and take better care of children's growth.
In addition, this study also verified the two-stage moderating effects of cognitive styles and its two sub-dimensions of self-orientation and consequence-orientation. Over the past few decades, there has been ample research on the relationship between negative cognitive styles and depression. Negative cognition has been found to be a risk factor for depression. Under the model of cognitive depression, the negative cognitive pattern produced by individuals due to environmental pressure will have a huge impact on individuals' lives (Dalgleish & Power, 2000). The results show that cognitive styles can moderate the relationship between life events and social support, that is, positive cognitive style can alleviate the negative impact of life events on perceived social support, while negative cognitive style can further aggravate the impact. This further verifies the previous conclusion that life events interact with cognitive function (Hankin et al., 2001), and that the accumulation of life events can impair individual cognition and lead to more depressive symptoms. At the same time, cognitive styles can also moderate perceived social support and depression, that is, positive cognitive style can further strengthen the protective effect of social support on depression, while negative cognitive style can inhibit and reduce the protective effect. This conclusion is consistent with previous research (Adabel Lee, 2010). The results show that cognitive styles plays an important role in depression. Individuals with positive cognitive style can reduce the negative effect of life events on depression in many ways, while individuals with negative cognitive style will aggravate the negative effect on the original basis and bring more depression. This also tells us that it is extremely important to develop positive cognitive styles in children and adolescents. Cognitive patterns are formed early in life and persist throughout life. Children and teenagers are in this critical stage, family education and school education must pay attention to the cultivation of children's cognition, establish a positive cognitive way will largely determine the children's mental health in the future.
Our results confirm that life events and negative cognitive styles are risk factors for depressive symptoms in children and adolescents, and that social support is a protective factor for depression, which is consistent with previous studies (Guang et al., 2017). The mental health problem of children and adolescents is a hot issue in today's society. In recent years, the relevant "double reduction" policy issued by the state is just to better relieve the pressure of children's growth. Admittedly, every child will encounter more or less stressful events as they grow up, and it is difficult for us to change these events, but we can intervene in the path between life events and depression and try to change these variables to reduce depressive symptoms. Our study found that social support plays a mediating role, and cognitive style plays a moderating role in both mediation pathways. This also emphasizes the important role and influence of the outside world in the development of children and adolescents. When children grow up, they will not actively seek social support. At this time, parents, schools and relevant institutions need to pay more attention to the growth of children, pay attention to their life, care about them and accompany them, which can improve their psychological condition to a large extent. Besides, schools and parents should also pay attention to cultivating positive cognitive styles in children. We can see that under the same pressure, the effects of different cognitive styles are significantly different. Stress and frustration are inevitable in everyone's life. Having a positive cognitive style and actively coping with pressure will make us psychologically healthier in the face of life.
At the same time, there are some limitations in this study. First of all, this study is a cross-sectional study, which only shows the correlation of variables rather than causality. Future studies can use longitudinal research methods to further explore the relationship between variables. Secondly, all the questionnaires used in this study are self-reported. The questionnaire involves many practical situations in life. Although there are hints of instructions, the results of the questionnaire may be affected by the errors caused by social prejudice and self-defense of the participants. Subsequent studies can start from peer evaluation, teacher evaluation, parent evaluation and other channels. Thirdly, the sample selected in this study is children and adolescent in one district of Chongqing, so the results have certain limitations, and the follow-up research can expand the scope of investigation. Finally, this study only discussed the mediating relationship between these variables, but did not conduct a more detailed analysis of the influence of some potential moderating variables, such as gender and age, on depression. Subsequent studies could focus on the moderating effect of demographic variables.
Despite these limitations, this study is the first to examine the relationship between life events, social support, depression, and cognitive styles in children and adolescents. Unlike previous studies that only considered social support as a moderating variable, we tested the possibility that social support is a mediating variable. At the same time, we also discovered the cognitive styles and its two dimensions of two-stage moderation. The results also support our hypothesis that life events positively predict depressive symptoms in children and adolescents. At the same time, life events can indirectly predict the depressive symptoms of children and adolescents through the mediating role of social support, and cognitive styles can moderate the relationship between life events and social support and depression.