Inferential Style, School Teachers, and Depressive Symptoms in College Students

IntroductionTeaching behavior has an influence on academic (Perry, Donohue & Weinstein, 2007), psychosocial (Perry et al., 2007), and mental health outcomes including depressive symptoms (Pittard, Possel, & Smith, 2015; Possel, Rudasill, Adelson, Bjerg, Wooldridge, & Winkeljohn Black, 2013; Possel, Rudasill, Sawyer, Spence, & Bjerg, 2013). It is important to consider teaching behavior as a possible stressor for school students, as they are with teachers for most of the day, every day, totaling about 15,000 hours in elementary, middle, and high school (Rutter, 1982). However, support for the relationship between teaching behavior and mental health outcomes is inconsistent (Pittard et al., 2015; Possel, Rudasill, Adelson et al., 2013; Possel, Rudasill, Sawyer et al., 2013). Conceptualizing previous findings within a vulnerability-stress model like the hopelessness theory of depression (Abramson et al., 1989) could help explain these inconsistencies. Thus, for school students with a negative inferential style, some types of teaching behavior may be stressors, interacting with the existing negative inferential style to trigger depressive symptoms.It is important to consider the mental health of college-aged students, as depressive symptoms affect almost 50% of students at some point during college (Furr, Westfeld, McConnell, & Jenkins, 2001; Smith et al., 2001). In a nationwide survey, 31.3% of students reported that they had felt "so depressed that it was difficult to function" at some point during the previous 12 months and 12.6% reported that depression had interfered with their academics (ACHA, 2013, pp. 14). Further, depression is associated with a decrease in grade point average (e.g. Deroma, Leach, & Leverett, 2009) and leaving school (Arria et al., 2013). Even mild depression can have a significant influence on academic performance, and is as impairing as moderate or severe depression (Deroma et al., 2009). Hopelessness Theory of DepressionAbramson et al. (1989) proposed the hopelessness theory of depression, a vulnerability-stress model, to explain the development and maintenance of a subtype of depression known as hopelessness depression. Based on that model, making negative inferences, or conclusions, about stressful events is a vulnerability for developing hopelessness which leads to hopelessness depression (Abramson et al., 1989). Abramson et al. (1989) describe three inferential styles. The first includes making inferences about the cause of a stressful event, referring to when an individual attributes the stressful event to a cause that is stable, global, and/or internal. The second inferential style includes making inferences about the consequences of a stressful event, which involves inferring that the consequences of the stressful event will be dire (Abramson et al., 1989). The third inferential style includes making inferences about the self, given the experience of the stressful event, particularly, inferences of negative characteristics about the self because of the stressful event (Abramson et al., 1989). One way to conceptualize the association between the different inferential styles and hopelessness depression is described in the weakest link hypothesis. The weakest link hypothesis states that individuals are as vulnerable to developing hopelessness depression as their most negative inferential style (Abela & Sarin, 2002). To be more precise, Abela and Sarin (2002) argue that the weakest inference is the most accurate representation of an individual's inferential style. If an individual scores highly on one inferential style, indicating the worst or most negative inferential style, but scores low on the remaining two styles, this most negative inferential style reflects the real vulnerability of the individual and represents the highest risk to develop hopelessness depression (Abela & Sarin, 2002). Haeffel's (2010) and Abela et al. (2006) used the weakest link approach when examining significant interaction between stressful events and inferential style, which predicted depressive symptoms in college students and an adult clinical sample, respectively. …