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Sensitivity to emotional distress among intelligent adolescents: A short-term prospective study

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 October 2008

Suniya S. Luthar  and
Carol H. Ripple
Suniya S. Luthar*
Affiliation:
Yale University
Carol H. Ripple
Affiliation:
Yale University
*
Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Suniya S. Luthar, Ph.D., Department of Psychiatry, Yale University, 29 Sylvan Avenue, New Haven, CT 06519.
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Abstract

In this 6-month prospective study, interactions between intelligence and emotional distress were examined in predicting social competence among 138 inner-city adolescents. The attempt was to extend previous cross-sectional findings obtained with a similar sample of disadvantaged youth. Intelligence was assessed via a nonverbal test of cognitive abilities, and social competence was operationalized based on teacher and peer ratings and school grades. Distress variables examined in interaction with intelligence included internalizing and externalizing symptomatology as well as the more specific internalizing symptoms of depression and anxiety. Interaction effects obtained indicated that intelligent youth who reported high depression and anxiety at Time I showed decreases in social competence over time, whereas those low on initial distress showed improvements in social competence levels. No such associations between initial distress and subsequent social competence were seen among the less intelligent children. Findings are discussed in terms of theoretical issues and empirical evidence in developmental psychopathology, and implications for future research are noted.

Type
Articles
Information
Development and Psychopathology , Volume 6 , Issue 2 , Spring 1994 , pp. 343 - 357
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1994

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