Predicting Depression Symptoms Among College Students: The Influence of Parenting Style

This study examined parenting style variables in predicting college students’ depression symptoms. Participants were 989 college students who participated in the first wave of the Spit for Science project (Dick et al., 2011). This study described the prevalence of depression symptoms, including the percentage of the sample endorsing various depression symptoms, and the frequency depression scores were elevated at multiple time points. A hierarchical multiple regression was conducted to examine whether two dimensions of parenting style, Autonomy Granting and Parental Involvement, would interact in predicting depression symptoms in the Junior year. The present study demonstrates that parenting style predicts a small but significant amount of variance in depression symptoms, after controlling for demographic characteristics, and these variables interact in producing their effect. Overall, findings suggest that depression symptoms are common and parenting style is relevant in understanding such symptoms