Explaining the Gender Difference in Depressive Symptoms

Abstract

It was hypothesized that women are more vulnerable to depressive symptoms than men because they are more likely to experience chronic negative circumstances (or strain), to have a low sense of mastery, and to engage in ruminative coping. The hypotheses were tested in a 2-wave study of approximately 1,100 community-based adults who were 25 to 75 years old. Chronic strain, low mastery, and rumination were each more common in women than in men and mediated the gender difference in depressive symptoms. Rumination amplified the effects of mastery and, to some extent, chronic strain on depressive symptoms. In addition, chronic strain and rumination had reciprocal effects on each other over time, and low mastery also contributed to more rumination. Finally, depressive symptoms contributed to more rumination and less mastery over time.  http://tiny.cc/wuyom

Women experience depression more often than men, whether depression is indexed by levels of depressive symptoms or by diagnosed unipolar depressive disorders (Kessler, McGonagle, Swartz, Blazer, & Nelson, 1993;Nolen-Hoeksema, 1990, 1995; Weissman & Klerman, 1977). This gender difference in depressive symptoms appears to emerge in early adolescence and then remains throughout the adult life span (Kessler et al., 1993; Nolen-Hoeksema & Girgus, 1994).

Although the existence of a gender difference in depressive symptoms is well established, the reasons for this gender difference are not clear (McGrath, Keita, Strickland, & Russo, 1990; Nolen-Hoeksema, 1987, 1990, 1995). A variety of social and personality explanations for women's greater vulnerability to depressive symptoms have been offered. The relationships among the social and personality factors leading to more depression in women have not been explored. Instead, most of these factors have been tested separately, with the other factors being ignored. In the study reported here, we examined how social conditions and personality characteristics affect each other and contribute to the gender difference in depressive symptoms. Learn more here http://tiny.cc/wuyom

Role of Environment in the Gender Difference in Depressive Symptoms

Behavioral and feminist theories of women's greater vulnerability to depressive symptoms compared with that of men generally attribute this vulnerability to the negative consequences of women's lower social status and power (Bandura, 1986; Miller, 1976; Radloff, 1975; Seligman, 1975). Because of this lower status and power, women experience more negative events and have less control over important areas of their lives than men. A host of specific negative life events or circumstances have been proposed to play a role in the greater vulnerability to depression of women than of men (for reviews, see McGrath et al., 1990, and Nolen-Hoeksema, 1990). Some of the most frequently cited include work overload and unequal power and status in heterosexual relationships.

Although women may make less money than men, they appear to work more hours per week than men when all the roles that they perform are considered. Women often work full time in the paid workforce and do nearly all the child care and domestic work of the home (Barnett, Brennan, & Marshall, 1994; Crosby, 1982). In addition, women are increasingly “sandwiched” between caring for young children and caring for sick and older family members. This work overload is proposed to contribute to a sense of burnout and general distress, including depressive symptoms, in women (Gove & Tudor, 1973; Hobfoll, 1991; McIntosh, Keywell, Reifman, & Ellsworth, 1994).

Another chronic strain for women may be that they do not feel valued for who they are or for their roles in their partnerships and families (Jack, 1991; Miller, 1976). They may “silence” their opinions and desires in favor of keeping a positive emotional tone in their relationships (Helgeson, 1994; Jack, 1991). When they do try to voice their opinions and desires, they may feel unappreciated or unheard.

How would these negative circumstances lead to depression in women? Behavioral and cognitive theories of depression have suggested that a chronic lack of control over their environment leads people to develop a generalized expectation that they cannot control events; this situation then leads to the symptoms of depression—lowered motivation, passivity, self-esteem loss, and the inability to see opportunities to control the environment (Bandura, 1977; Lewinsohn, Hoberman, Teri, & Hautzinger, 1985; Seligman, 1975). The generalized expectation of no control has been labeled learned helplessness (Seligman, 1975), low self-efficacy (Bandura, 1977), and low mastery (Dweck, 1975; Pearlin & Schooler, 1978).

In keeping with feminist theories, Nolen-Hoeksema (1987, 1991) has argued that women's lack of social power also contributes to their tendency to engage in rumination more than men when distressed. Rumination involves passively and repetitively focusing on one's symptoms of distress (“I'm so tired,” “I'm so unmotivated”) and on the meanings and consequences of the distress (“What's wrong with my life” “My boss is going to get annoyed if I keep missing deadlines”). Both questionnaire studies and laboratory studies have found that women are more likely than men to ruminate and focus on emotion when sad or depressed (cf. Butler & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1994,Nolen-Hoeksema, Morrow, & Fredrickson, 1993, and Nolen-Hoeksema, Parker, & Larson, 1994). Women may ruminate more because they are searching for ways in which they can control their environment and their distress but do not feel efficacious about exerting that control and thus remain stuck in rumination. In turn, a number of laboratory and field studies have shown that people who engage in rumination when distressed show longer and more severe periods of depressive symptoms and are more likely to develop full depressive disorders than those who do not engage in rumination (Alloy & Abramson, 1997; Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1991; Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1993; Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1994).

In sum, several theories suggest that the greater experience of negative life events of women than of men may lead both to low mastery and to rumination; these, in turn, contribute to more depression in women than in men. Free information http://tiny.cc/wuyom

Effects of Mastery and Rumination on Stressful Experiences

Just as the environment can shape personality, personality factors can influence individuals' environments (Caspi, in press; Magnusson, 1990; Sameroff, 1983). Thus, less mastery and more rumination may contribute to more stressful experiences in women's lives. Because women do not believe that they have control over their lives, they may not exert the control that they do have, leading to more negative life events (Bandura, 1986;Seligman, 1975). For example, they may not seek better jobs or remove themselves from inequitable and stressful partnerships.

Rumination may also contribute to more stress over time. Previous research has shown that rumination can interfere with problem solving (cf. Lyubomirsky, Caldwell, & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1998, and Lyubomirsky & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1995). Thus, women's greater tendency to ruminate compared with that of men may impede women from solving their current problems and cause them to accumulate new problems. Rumination also contributes to increasingly negative thinking and thus may be a cause of low mastery (Lyubomirsky et al., 1998; Lyubomirsky & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1995; Pyszczynski & Greenberg, 1987).

Summary of Modeling Results

In summary, tests of the gender effects-only model showed that women reported more chronic strain and rumination, less mastery, and more depressive symptoms at Time 1 and that gender was also a significant predictor of more chronic strain, rumination, and depressive symptoms at Time 2, after controlling for Time 1 measures of these variables. Tests of the feedback effects model showed that (a) rumination predicted more chronic strain over time, (b) chronic strain predicted more rumination over time, (c) mastery predicted more rumination over time, and (d) Time 2 mastery was predicted only by Time 1 mastery. Tests of the depression effects model showed that depressive symptoms at Time 1 predicted more rumination and less mastery over time but did not predict chronic strain. Both the feedback effects model and the depression effects model showed that (a) the gender difference in depressive symptoms was mediated by rumination, mastery, and chronic strain, (b) chronic strain appeared to have only indirect effects on depressive symptoms mediated through rumination, and (c) both rumination and mastery had direct effects on depressive symptoms. Finally, tests of the interaction effects model showed that rumination consistently amplified the effects of mastery on depressive symptoms at both Time 1 and Time 2 and that the interaction between rumination and chronic strain predicted significant variance in depressive symptoms at Time 2 but not Time 1. Overall, the model that fit the data best was the depression effects model, possibly because it was the most saturated model.

Discussion

The gender difference in depression is one of the most robust phenomena in epidemiology. Women are more prone to depression than men in many countries, cultures, and ethnicities (McGrath et al., 1990; Nolen-Hoeksema, 1990; Weissman & Klerman, 1977). The robustness of this phenomenon has led some theorists to suggest that it may have a biological basis, although little evidence for a biological basis has been found (seeNolen-Hoeksema, 1990, for a review). The results of this study suggest that the robustness of the gender difference in depression may be due to the relationships among chronic strain, rumination, mastery, and depression, which keep some women caught in a cycle of passivity and despair.

Women reported more chronic strain, a greater tendency to ruminate, and a lower sense of mastery than men. These gender differences in social and personality variables fully mediated the gender difference in depressive symptoms. Moreover, chronic strain, rumination, and mastery appeared to contribute to each other. Rumination consistently amplified the effects of mastery on depressive symptoms: Low mastery was more strongly associated with depressive symptoms among high ruminators than among low ruminators. Further, low mastery at Time 1 predicted more rumination at Time 2, after controlling for rumination at Time 1. Thus, ruminators suffered more depressive symptoms when they had low mastery and, in turn, low mastery contributed to more rumination over time.

Rumination also amplified the effects of chronic strain on depressive symptoms at one of the testing sessions. The more consistent relationship between chronic strain and rumination, however, was a reciprocal effect: More chronic strain predicted more rumination over time, and more rumination predicted more chronic strain over time. Below we discuss the effects of each of the major variables in this study and the implications of our results.

Effects of Chronic Strain

The chronic strains reported by many women in this study were the grinding annoyances and burdens that come with women's lower social power. Women carried a greater load of the housework and child care and more of the strain of parenting than men. Women felt less affirmed and appreciated by their partners than men. There are doubtless other strains not included in our measure but experienced more often by women than by men, such as sexual harassment and the threat of violence, that also contribute to women's burden (McIntosh et al., 1994). Still, our measure of strains was correlated with higher levels of depressive symptoms, suggesting that these strains do contribute to women's greater vulnerability to depressive symptoms compared with men's.

The contribution of chronic strain to the gender difference in depressive symptoms appears to be mediated through rumination, however. That is, greater chronic strain was associated with a greater tendency to ruminate in both cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses. However, there were no direct effects of chronic strain on depressive symptoms when rumination was included in the longitudinal analyses.7 This result suggests that rumination is the intrapersonal consequence of chronic strain and the link between strain and depressive symptoms.

Why would chronic strains lead to more rumination in women? These grinding burdens may convince some women that there is little that they can do to control their lives; this feeling may then contribute to rumination. However, we suspect that most women (and men) under chronic strain hold out some hope that there is something that they can do to improve their situation and thus do not become fully hopeless and helpless (cf.Garber, Miller, & Abramson, 1980, and Wortman & Brehm, 1975). Instead, they search for some understanding of why their lives are not going as they wish, why they feel frustrated and distressed so much of the time, what they can do to convince their partners to share in the work of the home and child care (happily), and how they might be better appreciated by their partners and families. This searching may be manifested as the rumination that we saw more often in women than in men. Unfortunately, the answers to the questions that women ask themselves in their ruminations are not easy. Many women who, by objective standards, are in inequitable and nonnurturing relationships or are being directly discriminated against in the workplace do not—perhaps cannot—acknowledge that they are being victimized (Crosby, 1982). Even when they acknowledge their victimization, women often do not have the resources to break away from that victimization (Belle, 1982). If a woman does not want to break away from an inequitable relationship but wants to improve that relationship, the attitudes of the partner and the patterns of exchange between her and the partner, which may be entrenched, must be changed. Thus, many women under chronic strain may retain a moderate sense of mastery but may ruminate about the causes of their situation, their feelings about the situation, and what they should do about it. This rumination then contributes to depressive symptoms.

Many, perhaps most, women bear up under chronic strain remarkably well. The relatively small correlations between chronic strain and the other variables suggest that many women who were under chronic strain did not become ruminative, lose faith in their ability to control their lives, or develop depressive symptoms. How do women do this? Some women may accept strains as “the way things are” and find ways to live with them rather than ruminating about them. They may also shift their attention to aspects of their lives that they can control, thus maintaining a general sense of control over their lives (cf. Crosby, 1982, and Linville, 1987). Women may support each other through these strains, reducing the impact of strains on control beliefs, rumination, and depressive symptoms. In addition, having a positive, gratifying experience in one role, such as at work, may offset the impact of strain in other roles, such as the family, for many women (Barnett & Baruch, 1985; Barnett, Marshall, & Singer, 1992; Crosby, 1987; Kandel, Davies, & Raveis, 1985; Repetti & Crosby, 1984; Stewart & Malley, 1987).

Effects of Rumination

Rumination had a direct effect on depressive symptoms, as it has in previous studies (Nolen-Hoeksema & Larson, 1999; Nolen-Hoeksema & Morrow, 1991; Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1993; Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 1994). The mechanisms by which rumination exacerbates and maintains depressive symptoms may be numerous. Laboratory studies have shown that people induced to ruminate when in a depressed mood generate more negative memories from the past, are more pessimistic in their evaluations of hypothetical and real events in the present, and are more fatalistic about the future (Lyubomirsky et al., 1998; Lyubomirsky & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1993, 1995). In turn, these negative cognitions may contribute to and prolong depressive symptoms directly or indirectly by impairing problem solving (Beck, Rush, Shaw, & Emery, 1979; Lyubomirsky & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1995). In addition, a field study suggested that people who ruminate may lose social support, perhaps because they continue to ruminate about their distress instead of taking action to overcome it and by doing so alienate others (Nolen-Hoeksema & Davis, 1999); in that study, low social support was associated with elevated depressive symptoms over time.

In this study, people who were more prone to ruminate evidenced more chronic strain over time. Rumination may maintain chronic strain because it drains people of the motivation, persistence, and problem-solving skills to change their situations. Laboratory studies have shown that people induced to ruminate when distressed are less willing to engage in activities that they can acknowledge might make them feel better and generate lower-quality solutions to complex interpersonal problems (Lyubomirsky et al., 1998; Lyubomirsky & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1993, 1995). Failing to do what one can to overcome stressful situations, such as an unfulfilling marriage or an inequitable distribution of labor at home, perpetuates these situations.

Conclusions

The results of this study suggest that women carry a triad of vulnerabilities to depressive symptoms compared to men: more chronic strain, a greater tendency to ruminate when distressed, and a lower sense of their mastery over their lives. In turn, these variables contribute to each other. So what is a depressed woman, under chronic strain and ruminating or lacking a belief that she can control her life, to do? Helping women achieve a greater sense of control over their circumstances and engage in problem solving rather than ruminating should be useful. Changing the social circumstances that many women face so that they do not have so much to ruminate about is equally important. Learn more now, Click this link http://tiny.cc/wuyom