J Youth Adolesc. 2025 Aug 25. doi: 10.1007/s10964-025-02246-0. Online ahead of print.
ABSTRACT
While existing research has well documented child perfectionism as a risk factor for depressive symptoms, relatively limited studies have delved into the specific influence of parental child-oriented perfectionism on children’s depressive symptoms. This study tracked 2228 Chinese adolescents (baseline Mage = 12.95 ± 0.79 years, 46.3% girls) with five measurements over three years. Using the Random Intercept Cross-Lagged Panel Model (RI-CLPM), results indicated that maternal (not paternal) child-oriented perfectionism had bidirectional links with children’s maladaptive perfectionism. Children’s maladaptive perfectionism and depressive symptoms exhibited stable reciprocal prediction. SES and child sex moderate effects: three-way links were more stable in low SES families; boys showed more stable reciprocal prediction between maladaptive perfectionism and depressive symptoms; maternal child-oriented perfectionism and girls’ maladaptive perfectionism exhibited some reciprocal prediction. These findings provide insights into how parental child-oriented perfectionism as well as child maladaptive perfectionism was involved in the development of child depressive symptoms, thus informing strategies to cope with child depressive symptoms.
PMID:40853423 | DOI:10.1007/s10964-025-02246-0
Recent Comments