Family cohesion, family adaptability, social support, and adolescent depressive symptoms in outpatient clinic families.

The relationships among adolescent depressive symptoms and self-reported family cohesion, adaptability, satisfaction with family functioning, family structure, and social support received from family and friends were investigated in a sample of 93 families attending family therapy at an outpatient clinic. Results were in keeping with previous studies of nonclinical samples, in that family cohesion and family social support were inversely related to depression. In contrast to nonclinical samples, family characteristics were more strongly associated with depression among boys than among girls, and social support from friends did not act as a buffer against depression. The strongest predictor of depressive symptoms was adolescents' levels of satisfaction with the cohesiveness and adaptability in their families, suggesting the importance of subjective cognitive appraisal in the link between family functioning and depression. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)