Margit Wångby

Development of adjustment problems in girls: what syndromes emerge?

The development of a broad spectrum of adjustment problems in girls was studied longitudinally from late childhood to early adulthood. A specific interest concerned how well the externalizing-internalizing distinction could explain the data. The sample consisted of about 500 Swedish girls, reasonably representative of the general population. Variable-oriented methods were complemented with person-oriented methods to study syndrome formation at the level of the individual. The results suggested a rather diversified pattern of multi-problem syndromes in late childhood, whereas the syndrome structure in early adolescence was organized around a differentiation between girls with externalizing adjustment problems and girls with peer problems. An externalizing syndrome was found to be stable between late childhood and early adolescence, increasing the risk of severe maladjustment in adulthood. Internalizing problems showed no clear-cut continuity with adult maladjustment. Results are discussed in relation to the externalizing-internalizing distinction, which to some extent is called in question.

The role of personal standards in clinically significant perfectionism. A person-oriented approach to the study of patterns of perfectionism

Clinically significant perfectionism is defined as patterns of perfectionism which are over-represented in clinical samples and under-represented in non-clinical samples. The present study contrasted two hypotheses about what characterizes clinically significant perfectionism: the two-factor theory and perfectionism/acceptance theory. First, a person-oriented approach by means of cluster analysis was used to identify typical patterns of perfectionism. These clusters were then cross-tabulated with two clinical samples (patients with social phobia and patients with panic disorder) and a non-clinical sample. The results showed that patterns of clinically significant perfectionism combined high Concern over Mistakes (CM) and Doubts about Action (DA) with high Personal Standards (PS) (and to a lesser extent also high Organization)––which is consistent with perfectionism/acceptance theory, but at odds with the two-factor theory. The results illustrate the value of a person-oriented methodological approach as a complement to the traditional variable-oriented approach.

Stability and change in health-related behaviors of midlife swedish women

We investigated the dimensions and stability in health-related behaviors (HRBs) among midlife Swedish women, and the factors that predicted change in those behaviors. At age 43, 569 women from a representative longitudinal sample completed questionnaires about lifestyle (diet, exercise, smoking, alcohol) and participated in medical screening. Four years later we mailed a follow-up questionnaire. HRBs clustered in two dimensions: healthy eating and addictions. There was a high degree of stability in HRBs; all women slightly increased their HRBs over time. After controlling for previous HRBs, we found that education, marital status, and having children at home were significant predictors of HRBs 4 years later.

Girls' Stable Peer Status and Their Adulthood Adjustment: A Longitudinal Study from Age 10 to Age 43.

Stable peer status clusters of rejected, popular, and average girls from ages 10 to 13 were identified and associated to young and middle adulthood adjustment. The study included a representative sample of 445 females from the longitudinal research program Individual Development and Adaptation. Results showed that, by young adulthood, rejected girls were at increased risks for criminal offending and especially alcohol abuse (two and eight times increased risk, respectively). In midlife, popular girls had achieved a more successful vocational career than average girls. However, for most midlife adjustment areas, like social relations and subjective well-being, there were no significant differences between the stable childhood clusters. To test an incidental explanatory model, childhood confounding variables (aggression, withdrawal, academic achievement, and SES) were introduced and explained some of the significant relations.

Causal Thinking About Somatic Symptoms—How Is It Related to the Experience of Symptoms and Negative Affect?

The relation between causal thinking about somatic symptoms (psychological, somatic, and external symptom attribution) and the experience of somatic complaints and negative affect was studied in a community sample of 208 individuals. Although cluster analysis identified groups of individuals with psychological, somatic, and external attribution styles, the analysis also revealed groups of individuals with combinations of high or low scores on two or three attribution dimensions. Consistent with previous research, psychological attribution of symptoms was associated with a higher degree of somatic complaints and negative affect; this effect, however, was primarily due to a group of “psychologizers/externalizers,” and not to the pure “psychologizers.” Also in replication of earlier studies, all three attribution subscales were intercorrelated. The findings are discussed in terms of rumination processes. It is argued that the findings concerning psychological symptom attribution have received too little attention in the literature so far, probably because they go against dominant theoretical paradigms in psychosomatic medicine.