Mediating role of cognitive biases, resilience and depressive symptoms in the relationship between childhood trauma and psychotic-like experiences in young adults.

OBJECTIVES

The present study aimed to test a hypothetical model where causally linked and ordered cognitive biases, resilience and depressive symptoms serve as mediators of the relationship between early traumatic life events and psychotic-like experiences (PLEs) in the general population of young adults.

METHODS

Two thousand six hundred and fourteen people (1673 females) took part in the online survey. Participants completed self-report questionnaires measuring exposure to early traumatic life events, PLEs, cognitive biases, resilience and depressive symptoms. Correlation and multiple mediation analyses were performed.

RESULTS

All three mediators turned out to be significantly correlated with early trauma, PLEs and with each other. Mediational analysis demonstrated that hypothesized model of causally linked mediators was significant (P ≤ .001) and accounted for 33% (P < .001) of the explained variance in PLEs in comparison to 11% (P ≤ .001) without mediators.

CONCLUSIONS

First, our results provide evidence for significant associations between early traumatic life events, cognitive biases, depressive symptoms, psychological resilience and PLEs. Second, they indicate significant indirect effects of early trauma exposure on PLEs through a path consisted of cognitive biases, psychological resilience and depressive symptoms that suggest a possible importance of interventions bolstering resilience in young people in order to minimize the severity of depressive and psychotic psychopathology.