Within-person level dynamics for the interplay between parental psychological control and adolescents' depressive symptoms: A differentiated, multidimensional approach.

Parental psychological control (PPC) has long been proposed as a salient risk factor for adolescent depressive symptoms (ADS). However, findings from prior studies are inconsistent regarding how PPC and ADS may interplay with each other over time. They mostly treat PPC as if it is a monolithic entity rather than a collection of discrete elements with possibly different effects. A majority of them also fail to distinguish between-person effects from within-person effects. Leveraging four-wave, longitudinal data from 962 Chinese adolescents (45.1% boys, Mage = 12.369, SD = 0.699 at Time 1), we sought to delineate the patterns of interplay between PPC and ADS, while distinguishing between-person intercepts and slopes from within-person cross-lagged effects. When doing so, we differentiated PPC into five separate components (i.e., relationship-oriented guilt induction, social comparison shaming, shared shame, love withdrawal, and harsh psychological control). Most importantly, results at the within-person level indicated that despite concurrent positive associations between all forms of PPC and ADS at each time point, cross-lagged positive associations across waves were identified only for parental harsh psychological control, and such cross-lagged associations were reciprocal over time. Notably, these within-person effects remained even after applying multiple-testing corrections and controlling for adolescents' academic achievement across waves. Our findings highlight the importance of approaching the dynamic implications of PPC for adolescent well-being from a differentiated, multidimensional perspective, which would help reveal nuances that have been obscured in prior studies and better inform the design of more targeted interventions.