Brooding Rumination and Risk for Depressive Disorders in Children of Depressed Mothers

The goal of the current study was to examine the role of brooding rumination in children at risk for depression. We found
that children of mothers with a history of major depression exhibited higher levels of brooding rumination than did children
of mothers with no depression history. Examining potential mechanisms of this risk, we found no evidence for shared genetic
influences (BDNF or 5-HTTLPR) or modeling of mothers’ rumination. However, we did find that children with a history of prior depressive disorders
exhibited higher current levels of brooding rumination than children with no depression history. Importantly, children’s brooding
predicted prospective onsets of new depressive episodes over a 20-month follow-up even when we statistically controlled for
depressive symptom levels at the initial assessment, suggesting that the predictive effect of brooding rumination in children
was not due simply to co-occurring depressive symptoms.