Given high levels of stress in the family environment associated with parental depression, the way in which offspring of depressed parents cope with this stress may function as a source of increased risk or resilience. Coping is defined as “conscious volitional efforts to regulate emotion, cognition, behavior, physiology, and the environment in response to stressful events or circumstances” (Compas et al. 2001, p. 89). Drawing on the work of Weisz et al. (1994), this control-based model of coping organizes strategies into three categories: primary control coping (i.e., changing the stressor or acting directly upon your emotions), secondary control coping (i.e., adapting to the stressor), and disengagement coping (i.e., avoiding the stressor). Coping is associated with both internalizing and externalizing problems in youth (Compas et al. 2014). Increased use of both primary and secondary control coping has been linked to fewer internalizing symptoms and specifically fewer symptoms of anxiety and depression across a number of samples. Increased use of disengagement coping has been linked to increased symptoms in these samples (e.g., Raviv and Wadsworth 2010; Wads-worth and Compas 2002).
