Early adversity confers risk for depression in part through its association with recent (i.e., proximal) acute stress. However, it remains unresolved whether: a) early adversity predicts increases in recent acute stress over time; b) all – or only certain types – of recent events mediate the relationship between early adversity and depression; and c) early adversity places individuals at greater risk for depression via greater exposure to independent (i.e., fateful) interpersonal events or via greater generation of dependent (i.e., partially self-initiated) interpersonal events (i.e., stress generation) or both. These questions were examined in a 3-wave longitudinal study of early adolescent girls (N = 125; M = 12.35 years [SD = .77]) with no history of diagnosable depression using contextual life stress and diagnostic interviews. Path analyses indicated that increases in past-year acute interpersonal, but not non-interpersonal, stress mediated the link between early adversity and depressive symptoms. The mediating role of interpersonal events was limited to independent ones, suggesting increases in interpersonal event exposure, not interpersonal stress generation, acted as a mediator. Finally, findings support prior evidence that early adversity may not directly predict future depressive symptoms. Implications for understanding the role of recent stress in the association between early adversity and adolescent depression are discussed.

This study investigated cardiovascular reactivity of hypertensive adults during periods of emotional stress. Two types of instructions were given at different moments, to the same subject, either to express or to suppress feelings during role-play. Expressing, but not inhibiting, emotions elicited significantly higher reactivity during responding to negative scenes, followed by responding during the positive interactions. Blood pressure increases in both expressing and inhibiting conditions, were also found during the instruction periods. Results indicated that socially demanding situations represent a stressor whose effects may vary depending on whether or not respondents regulate expression of emotions. It is suggested that the difficulty in expressing emotions found in some hypertensive individuals may have the function of controlling or reducing blood pressure reactivity.

Background: Sleep problems are common in the general population. A strong association between stress due to inadequate social relationships or loneliness and sleep problems has been found. This paper aims to investigate stress in close social relationships in relation to disrupted sleep patterns in middle-aged and older adults. In addition, in exploring the underlying processes involved in poor social interactions, loneliness is assumed to be a mediator in the stress-sleep quality relation.

Methods: Data from a community sample of 7074 Norwegian middle-aged and older adults in the Hordaland Health Study (HUSK) were used to examine the mediating role of loneliness.

Results: A significant association between interpersonal stress and both nocturnal sleep problems and daytime sleepiness was found in both age groups. This relation was mediated by loneliness (indirect path) as well as effected by a direct path (RMSEA = 0.051; CFI = 0.93). The size of the indirect effect varied with age. Nocturnal sleep problems were fully mediated by loneliness in the older group, while 74% of the total effect was mediated through loneliness in the middle-aged group. For daytime sleepiness, a partial mediation of 36% and 40% was observed for the two groups respectively.

Conclusions: The mediation effects found in this study indicate that the wider social aspects of an individual's life should be taken into account when planning interventions for improving sleep quality in the elderly.