2020

What was already know by this subject?

• Anxiety disorders are common in adolescence
• Previous studies have found that the risk to develop anxiety was related to psychological, biological, and environmental characteristics of adolescents, but these factors were not investigated jointly in the same study
• By studying these risk factors together, we can learn more about the development of anxiety in young people

What does this study add?

• We examined how sex, socio-economic status, parents’ anxiety and depression, stressful life events, personality, and biological factors (cortisol, heart rate, blood pressure, body mass index) were related to having an anxiety disorder during adolescence
• A quarter of all TRAILS participants had experienced an anxiety disorder when they were 19 years old, girls twice as often as boys
• In addition to girls, the risk of anxiety disorders was also higher for adolescents whose father or mother had had an anxiety disorder, who were easily frustrated, and who had little self-control. Biological factors were not related to anxiety disorders in this study