Harbingers of Depressotypic Reassurance Seeking: Negative Life Events, Increased Anxiety, and Decreased Self-Esteem

Abstract

No previous study has examined the initial stages of the depressive interpersonal spiral described by Coyne. The authors’ purpose was to elucidate predictions regarding the formative stages of the spiral and to put them to empirical test in a prospective study of college undergraduates ( N = 177). The authors predicted and found that (a) negative life events predicted increases in anxiety, decreases in self-esteem, and increases in reassurance-seeking; (b) negative life events predicted changes in reassurance seeking via their influence on anxiety and self-esteem; and (c) this mediational role was relatively specific to anxiety and self-esteem and did not apply to depression. Understanding the groundwork of the depressive interpersonal spiral may point to its prevention.