GENDER-LINKED VULNERABILITIES TO DEPRESSIVE SYMPTOMS, STRESS, AND PROBLEM BEHAVIORS IN ADOLESCENTS

Ample research has shown that female adolescents endorse more internalizing and fewer externalizing symptoms than do male adolescents, but explanations for these gender differences have not been forthcoming. In this review, we integrated research findings of gender differences in subtypes of depressive vulnerabilities and in reactivity to stressful life events involving the self or others in order to suggest possible explanations of gender differences in adolescent psychopathology. Adolescent girls show greater interpersonal depressive vulnerability and greater reactivity to stressful events involving others. In contrast, gender differences have not been found in adolescents' self-critical depressive vulnerability and in their reactivity to stressful events involving issues of self-worth. We argue that adolescents with heightened interpersonal depressive vulnerability (who fear abandonment and seek attention and nurturing) arree more reactive to stressful events involving others and are more likely to exhibit internalizing than externalizing syndromes. On the other hand, adolescents with heightened self-critical depressive vulnerability (who experience guilt and self-blame and avoid interpersonal intimacy) are more reactive to stressful events involving threats to the self and are more likely to exhibit externalizing, in addition to internalizing, syndromes.