Perfectionism in children: associations with depression, anxiety, and anger

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Abstract

The relationships among measures of dimensions of perfectionism, depression, anxiety, stress, and anger were investigated in 114 children (45 males and 69 females, aged 10–15 years). Based on previous research [e.g. Hewitt, P. L. & Flett, G. L. (1993). Dimensions of perfectionism, daily stress, and depression: a test of the specific vulnerability hypothesis. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 102, 58–65], self-oriented perfectionism and socially prescribed perfectionism were hypothesized to interact with either achievement stress or social stress to predict concurrent depression. Participants completed the Child-Adolescent Perfectionism Scale, Children's Depression Inventory, Children's Manifest Anxiety Scale-Revised, Children's Hassles Scale, and Pediatric Anger Expression Scale. Results revealed that self-oriented perfectionism was significantly associated with depression and anxiety, whereas socially prescribed perfectionism was significantly correlated with depression, anxiety, social stress, anger-suppression, and outwardly directed anger. Findings also indicated that: (1) self-oriented perfectionism interacted with social stress to predict anxiety; and that (2) self-oriented perfectionism interacted with achievement stress and with social stress to predict depression. Results suggest that dimensions of perfectionism may be relevant variables in, and differential predictors of, maladjustment and distress in children.

Section snippets

Participants

In total, 114 students (45 boys and 69 girls) from three schools in an urban center participated in this study. Students ranging in age from 10 to 15 [mean age of 12.30 (S.D.=1.77) years] comprised the sample. The grade level of the participants ranged between Grades 5 and 10, and 47% of the participants were in Grades 5 and 6.

Child-Adolescent Perfectionism Scale (CAPS; Flett et al., 2000)

The CAPS is a 22-item, self-report measure that assesses self-oriented and socially prescribed perfectionism in children with a minimum Grade 3 reading level. Items are

Results

The means and standard deviations for measures of perfectionism, depression, anxiety, anger, and stress are presented in Table 1 and zero-order correlations between the perfectionism and distress measures are below the diagonal in Table 2. Self-oriented perfectionism was positively correlated with depression and anxiety, but was not associated with the anger or stress measures. This suggests that depression and anxiety may be outcomes of perfectionism that involve requiring the self to be

Discussion

This study examined whether self-oriented and socially prescribed perfectionism were associated with domains of maladjustment including depression, anxiety, anger, and achievement and social stress in children. Self-oriented and socially prescribed perfectionism were associated with a number of forms of maladjustment. Moreover, there was evidence that self-oriented perfectionism interacted with both self-related/achievement stress and social stress to predict depression and with social stress

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by a grant from the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (410-97-1278).

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