Why is my world so dark? Effects of child physical and emotional abuse on child depression: The mediating role of self-compassion and negative automatic thoughts

Abstract

Background: The adverse effects of childhood maltreatment on the mental health of individuals have received increasing attention. However, it is unclear whether the effects of invisible emotional abuse and visible physical abuse differ on child depression and the mediating processes under this relationship.

Objective: This study aimed to investigate whether self-compassion and negative automatic thoughts mediated the effects of physical abuse and emotional abuse on child depression and the underlying mechanistic differences.

Participants and setting: Using a two-wave longitudinal design, a total of 946 elementary school students completed the self-report questionnaires at two-time points, including child abuse, self-compassion, negative automatic thoughts, and depression.

Methods: This study constructed structural equation models (SEM) to examine the mediating role of self-compassion and negative automatic thoughts between emotional/physical abuse and child depression.

Results: After controlling for demographic covariates, structural equation modeling (SEM) showed that only physical abuse significantly and positively predicted child depression directly (β = 0.16, p < 0.01). Emotional abuse was positively associated with child depression through self-compassion (β = 0.02, p < 0.05) and negative automatic thoughts (β = 0.02, p < 0.05), while physical abuse influenced child depression only via negative automatic thoughts (β = 0.07, p < 0.001).

Conclusions: The findings showed a strong association between emotional/physical abuse and child depression, but there were mechanistic differences under these relationships. Therefore, we also need to pay equal attention to the adverse effects of emotional abuse on children.

Keywords: Child depression; Emotional abuse; Negative automatic thoughts; Physical abuse; Self-compassion.