The mediator role of negative and positive automatic thoughts between attachment quality towards significant others and adolescents’ internalizing problems

Ionut Stelian Florean, Anca Dobrean, Gabriela Diana Roman, Costina-Ruxandra Poetar, Cristina Vîlceanu and Elena Predescu

Children and Youth Services Review, 2024, vol. 164, issue C

Abstract: Previous studies found that the insecure attachment of adolescents towards their mother, father, and peers leads to more internalizing problems and maladaptive cognitive processes (for example, low self-esteem). However, the dynamic between the attachment of adolescents, negative and positive automatic thoughts, and internalizing problems of adolescents is not well understood. The present study proposed and tested a theoretical model in which positive and negative automatic thoughts mediate the relationship between the attachment of adolescents towards their parents and peers and the internalizing problems of adolescents. A clinical sample of adolescents (N=105; mean age = 16.60), diagnosed with internalizing disorders, have filled out the evaluations for this study. All analyses were conducted in RStudio, and the mediation models were tested using Partial Least Square Structural Equation Modeling. Our main results are that positive and negative automatic thoughts mediate the relationship between adolescents’ parents- and peer-related attachment and internalizing problems. The biological sex and age of adolescents did not moderate any of the paths in the model. Parents and peer attachment, along with positive and negative automatic thoughts, explained 57 % of the variance in the internalizing problems of adolescents. The main findings of the paper are discussed, and the main caveats are underlined.

Keywords: Attachment; Mother; Father; Peers; Adolescents; Negative automatic thoughts; Positive automatic thoughts; Internalizing disorders (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0190740924004390
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:cysrev:v:164:y:2024:i:c:s0190740924004390

DOI: 10.1016/j.childyouth.2024.107867

Access Statistics for this article

Children and Youth Services Review is currently edited by Duncan Lindsey

More articles in Children and Youth Services Review from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().