TY - JOUR PY - 2023// TI - The effects of self-criticism and self-compassion on adolescents' depressive symptoms and nonsuicidal self-injury JO - Psychology research and behavior management A1 - Gao, Yemiao A1 - Liu, Xia A1 - Liu, Jinmeng A1 - Wang, Hui SP - 3219 EP - 3230 VL - 16 IS - N2 - PURPOSE: Symptoms of depression increase during adolescence as do nonsuicidal self-injurious behaviors (NSSI). The present study aimed to investigate how self-criticism interacted with the effects of stressful life events on depressive symptoms and NSSI and whether self-compassion would buffer these negative effects.

METHODS: A total of 908 Chinese adolescents (Mage = 13.46, SD = 0.57) completed a cross-sectional survey. The main and interacted effects of stressful life events, self-criticism, self-compassion on depressive symptoms and NSSI were examined respectively.

RESULTS: The results showed that self-criticism significantly moderated the relationships between stressful events and depression and NSSI. Self-compassion could buffer the negative impacts of stressful events and self-criticism on NSSI but not on depression. High self-compassion significantly reduced the magnitude of the association between stressful life events and NSSI in adolescents with low self-criticism but not in those with high self-criticism.

CONCLUSION: Self-criticism exacerbated the negative impacts of stressful life events on both depressive symptoms and NSSI, but self-compassion only buffered the impact of stressful life events on NSSI. Interventions designed to reduce NSSI risk of Chinese adolescents may benefit from training them to improve self-compassion abilities and to be less self-critical.

Language: en

LA - en SN - 1179-1578 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.2147/PRBM.S417258 ID - ref1 ER -