Chapter 3 106 support did not predict subsequent fluctuations in adolescents’ depressive symptoms within families at most timescales. Only when assessed with the annual dataset, and not with the biennial dataset, we found that increased perceived parental support predicted fewer depressive symptoms 2 years later. Furthermore, elevated adolescent depressive symptoms predicted a subsequent within-family decrease in perceived parental support at a bi-weekly and three-monthly timescale. Moreover, almost no sex differences or differences between adolescents scoring low or high on neuroticism were found in the cross-lagged effects. Hence, the findings mainly support adolescent-driven effects at meso timescales, suggesting that within-family lagged effects might not necessarily generalize to different timescales. Therefore, to guide future research about the interpersonal dynamics of adolescent depressive symptoms, this study suggests that theoretical models are urgently needed that explicitly hypothesize about the timescale(s) of family dynamics.
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