Influence of Environmental Antecedents on Joint Developmental Trajectories of Self-esteem and Depression in Childhood

Self-esteem and depression are variable and interrelated in children. However, it is unknown how they co-develop in the general child population and how their patterns of co-development may be related to environmental antecedents. The current study utilized a longitudinal dataset of 544 Chinese children ages 9-13 years to: (a) identify longitudinal associations and joint developmental trajectories of self-esteem and depression problems by CLPM, RI-CLPM, and parallel-process growth mixture models, and (b) investigate early environmental antecedents that might explain differentiated co-developmental patterns. We identified a reciprocal model and four subtypes of the dual-factor mental health framework, complete mental health group (37.6%), symptomatic but content group (16.2%), vulnerable group (38.3%), and troubled group (7.9%). Our study highlights the importance of risk factors (relational victimization and father-student conflict) rather than protective factors on the co-development of self-esteem and depression problems. These findings encourage the development of interventions to target children with both self-esteem and depression problems.