Lauren Spies - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Lauren Spies

Encyclopedia of Human Relationships

Encyclopedia of Victimology and Crime Prevention

Child Development, 2012

Is an attenuated physiological response to family conflict, seen in some youth exposed to early a... more Is an attenuated physiological response to family conflict, seen in some youth exposed to early adversity, protective or problematic? A longitudinal study including 54 youth (average age 15.2) found that those with higher cumulative family aggression exposure showed lower cortisol output during a laboratory-based conflict discussion with their parents, and were less likely to show the normative pattern of increased cortisol reactivity to a discussion they rated as more conflictual. Family aggression interacted with cortisol reactivity in predicting youth adjustment: adolescents from more aggressive homes who were also more reactive to the discussion reported more posttraumatic stress symptoms and more antisocial behavior. These results suggest that attenuated reactivity may protect youth from the negative consequences associated with aggressive family environments. Keywords cortisol; HPA axis; family conflict; childhood adversity; antisocial behavior How does a chronically aggressive family environment shape the development of children's stress response systems? Children reared in harsh family environments have been found to show both heightened and dampened profiles of cortisol, a stress hormone secreted by the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis that has been implicated in physical and mental health. For example, among adults with clinical disorders like depression and anxiety, past childhood adversity has been tied to elevated baseline cortisol and exaggerated stress reactivity (e.g. De Bellis et al.

Journal of Family Psychology, 2022

Restricted until 30 July 2010. The present study investigated the association between internalizi... more Restricted until 30 July 2010. The present study investigated the association between internalizing symptoms and physiological reactivity in a sample of 73 adolescents. The adolescents engaged in a stressor task, involving a 15-minute discussion with their parents, after which subjective distress was assessed. Saliva samples were collected before the stressor task and over a 70-minute period post-stressor, and were assayed for salivary cortisol and alpha-amylase as indices of the HPA axis and SAM system, respectively. Results demonstrate a negative main effect of internalizing symptoms and a positive main effect of subjective distress on HPA activity. Internalizing symptoms moderated the association between subjective distress and HPA reactivity. These findings suggest that attenuated physiological stress is part of a protective reaction to the effects of chronic HPA activation. The present study has important implications for the understanding of how mental health and physical heal...

Developmental Psychobiology, 2019

This study investigates bi-directional associations between adolescents' daily experiences of vic... more This study investigates bi-directional associations between adolescents' daily experiences of victimization and aggression perpetration within friendships. We investigated a) across-day associations between victimization and aggression perpetration; b) morning cortisol activity as a moderator of cross-day victimization and aggression links; and c) potential sex differences in these patterns. For four consecutive days, 99 adolescents (M age = 18.06, SD= 1.09, 46 females) reported whether they were victimized by or aggressive toward their friends. On three of these days, adolescents provided three morning saliva samples. Multilevel path analyses showed that across days, victimization and aggression were bi-directionally linked, but only for male adolescents. Additionally, for male adolescents, morning cortisol output (but not morning cortisol increase) moderated the association between victimization and next-day aggression; victimization predicted greater next-day aggression for boys with low, but not high, morning cortisol output. Findings implicate a physiological factor that may modify daily links between victimization and aggression in male adolescent friendships.

Health psychology : official journal of the Division of Health Psychology, American Psychological Association, 2018

Childhood adversity is a risk factor for the development of obesity in adulthood. Dysregulated hy... more Childhood adversity is a risk factor for the development of obesity in adulthood. Dysregulated hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) activity, which has been associated separately with both adverse childhood experiences and obesity, has been posited as a mechanism by which stressful experiences influence body mass index (BMI); however, this mechanism has not yet been tested longitudinally. The present study uses multireporter, longitudinal data across three time points to test whether the adolescent cortisol awakening response (CAR), an index of diurnal HPA activity, mediates the association between adversity in childhood and BMI in adulthood. Eighty-two youth, mothers, and fathers reported on adverse childhood experiences from middle childhood to late adolescence. During adolescence, youth provided saliva samples three times each morning across three days, which were assayed for cortisol to calculate CAR. During early adulthood, youth reported height and weight to calculate BMI. Gre...

Journal of research on adolescence : the official journal of the Society for Research on Adolescence, Jan 22, 2018

This study examines whether nonverbal displays of parents' warmth during an in-lab conflict d... more This study examines whether nonverbal displays of parents' warmth during an in-lab conflict discussion mitigate the links between affiliation with deviant peers and risky behaviors. A sample of 107 youth and their parents participated in a study spanning from mid-adolescence (T1) to late adolescence (T2). At T1, family members discussed a contentious issue, which was coded for parents' nonverbal warmth. At T1 and T2, youth reported on their friends' and their own risky behaviors. Fathers' warmth moderated each prospective association between deviant peers and risky behaviors. Mothers' warmth did not emerge as a significant moderator. Girls, in particular, benefitted from fathers' warmth as a buffer in the trajectory from T1 risky behaviors to T2 risky behaviors and deviant peers.

The Journal of adolescent health : official publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine, 2017

To assess short-term effects of daily worries on hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity and... more To assess short-term effects of daily worries on hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity and later implications for adolescents' health symptoms. We hypothesized that heightened worry would be associated with stronger next-morning cortisol awakening response (CAR) to prepare the body for the demands of the upcoming day. Guided by biological adaptation to stress theories, we also hypothesized that dysregulated CAR would heighten associations between worries and later health symptoms, while also testing direct associations between worries and dysregulated CAR and health. Ninety-nine late adolescents during waves 5 and 6 of a longitudinal study reported on 26 worries for 10 days. On 3 of the 10 days, participants also provided morning saliva samples that were assayed for cortisol to capture the CAR. At both waves, participants reported on 22 common health symptoms. Multilevel models showed significant within-person associations between high daily worries and next-morning heigh...

Journal of Research on Adolescence, 2016

This longitudinal study investigated how past versus current life stresses relate to adolescents&... more This longitudinal study investigated how past versus current life stresses relate to adolescents' cortisol awakening response (CAR), an index of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal activity. Ninety-nine adolescents reported previous year life stress at ages 12 and 18. At the second assessment, participants also provided self-reports of parent and peer attachment and 3 days of cortisol samples. Current stress was associated with heightened CAR for both males and females, whereas past stress was associated with attenuated CAR for males. Attachment to peers buffered the relationship between past stress and attenuated CAR for all adolescents; attachment to parents was a buffer for male adolescents only. Results demonstrate the protective roles of adolescent relationships and highlight sex differences in biopsychosocial development across adolescence.

Oxford Handbooks Online, 2014

Conducting therapy with couples and families creates unique ethical considerations. During couple... more Conducting therapy with couples and families creates unique ethical considerations. During couple therapy and family therapy, therapists may encounter ethical difficulties when identifying the goals of treatment in the face of family members’ conflicting desires, deciding when to disclose information obtained privately from one client to other family members, and managing risk in order to maintain client safety. Therapists can minimize these ethical dilemmas by clearly articulating their policies both during consent procedures and throughout treatment. Additionally, therapists who work with couples and families must be mindful of their own values and competencies in order to engage in ethical practice.

Physiology & Behavior, 2010

Journal of Research on Adolescence, 2013

This study investigated links between interparental conflict appraisals (specifically threat and ... more This study investigated links between interparental conflict appraisals (specifically threat and selfblame), sibling relationship quality (positive and negative dimensions), and anxiety in sibling pairs comprised of an adolescent and a younger sibling close in age. Sibling relationship quality was measured through behavioral observation. Links between self-blame and anxiety were moderated by sibling relationship quality. In older siblings, positive behavior with a sibling was associated with an attenuated relation between self-blame and anxiety. A paradoxical moderating effect was found for negative interactions; for both younger and older siblings, a relation between self-blame and anxiety was weakened in the presence of sibling negativity. Results offered support for theorized benefits of sibling relationship quality in helping early adolescents adjust to conflict between parents.

Journal of Adolescent Health, 2011

Purpose-Internalizing symptoms have been associated with both higher and blunted cortisol respons... more Purpose-Internalizing symptoms have been associated with both higher and blunted cortisol responses in adolescents. Little attention has been paid to subjective experiences of distress in conjunction with internalizing symptoms in hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis responses to laboratory stressors. This report examines whether adolescents' internalizing symptoms moderate the association between cortisol responses and distress in response to a common stressor in adolescence: family conflict. Differences are also examined between adolescents with current, past only, and no history of internalizing symptoms. Methods-Adolescents (N = 70) discussed areas of conflict with their parents and subsequently reported on distress experienced during the discussion. Baseline and 5 post-stressor saliva samples were collected. Adolescents' internalizing symptoms were assessed concurrently with the discussion and at three previous time-points. Results-Internalizing symptoms moderated the association between adolescents' reported distress and cortisol reactivity in response to family conflict. Adolescents with current and past internalizing symptoms had a blunted cortisol response, whereas adolescents with no history of internalizing symptoms showed greater cortisol reactivity when reporting greater distress. Conclusions-This study expands the understanding of how current and remitted internalizing symptoms are related to adolescents' responses to everyday family conflicts. Adolescents with current and past internalizing symptoms demonstrated a lack of correspondence between psychological and physiological stress, whereas adolescents with no history of internalizing symptoms showed the anticipated correspondence. This study has important implications for understanding the link between internalizing symptoms and adolescents' HPA functioning in response to common social stressors.