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Emerging gender differences in adolescent internalizing problems:
Interactions between individual characteristics and peer experiences
Internalizing disorders such as anxiety and depression are among the most frequently
diagnosed disorders in adolescents, with 7-17% of youth experiencing clinically significant
symptomatology (Costello et al., 2003) and many more experiencing subclinical (moderate-high)
symptomatology (Twenge & Nolen-Hoeksema, 2002). Importantly, research examining clinical
and subclinical symptoms documents that rates of internalizing problems increase markedly
around ages 12-13, particularly for girls (Brendgen et al., 2005; Kessler et al., 2005). The
cognitive diathesis × stress model (Alloy & Abramson, 2007) postulates that this increase may
be explained by the interaction of individual-level risk factors (e.g., maladaptive cognitive styles
such as characterological self-blame) that exist pre-adolescence being exacerbated due to
context-level challenges associated with adolescence (e.g., changes in peer relationships). The
differential susceptibility model (Belsky & Pluess, 2009) expands this argument and posits that
some youth may be more susceptible to positive and negative contextual influences. Given the
importance of peer relations in adolescence (Graber & Brooks-Gunn, 1996), this study examines
how adolescents’ pre-existing individual characteristics and ongoing peer interactions contribute
to change over time in their internalizing problems. Given the gender differences in internalizing
problems that emerge in early adolescence (Vasey & Ollendick, 2000), this study will further
assess how gender moderates these associations. We ask: 1) What is the shape of change in
adolescent internalizing problems and how does this change covary over time with adolescents’
peer experiences? 2) Do the within-time associations between adolescents’ internalizing
problems and their peer experiences vary as a result of their individual characteristics? and 3)
Does gender moderate the contributions of adolescents’ individual characteristics and their peer
experiences to changes in their internalizing problems?
Participants were 180 grade 7 students (60% girls; mean age = 12.7 years, SD = .44)
recruited from 2 junior high schools in a large Canadian city. Adolescents were ethnically
diverse: 70% ethnic minority (e.g., South Asian, Aboriginal, Black) and 30% Caucasian. Five
waves of data were collected biweekly across 8 weeks during the spring of one school year.
Adolescents’ internalizing problems (Bevans et al., 2012) and peer experiences (friendship
quality, Bukowski et al., 1994; peer victimization, Crick & Grotpeter, 1996) were assessed
biweekly whereas individual risks (maladaptive attributional style, Graham & Juvonen, 1998)
and competencies (social competence, Harter, 2012) were assessed only at baseline. All
constructs were assessed using adolescent self-reports. Our primary bivariate correlations of the
criterion constructs by gender are in the expected direction and indicate moderate-high stability
in the constructs. Importantly, 31% of correlations differ significantly by gender. Peer
experiences and attribution style in particular may have different implications for the
internalizing problems of adolescent boys and girls. Our primary analyses will use multiplegroup latent growth models (Mplus 7.3 Muthén & Muthén, 1998–2014) to examine whether
gender moderates the associations between change in adolescents’ internalizing problems, their
peer experiences, and their individual characteristics. Findings from this study will extend
current understanding of risk and protective factors of adolescent internalizing problems and how
these may differ by gender, particularly for ethnic minority adolescents.