Does Spousal Support Moderate the Association Between Perceived Racial Discrimination and Depressive Symptoms among African American Couples?

Social stress theory proposes that stress resulting from one's social position in society leads to fewer coping resources, and subsequently causes an increase in mental health problems. Guided by this framework, we investigated whether the relationship between perceived discrimination and depressive symptoms was moderated by spousal social support in a sample of 487 African American heterosexual couples. Using the actor-partner interdependence model, findings suggested that female partner's perceived racial discrimination was predictive of her depressive symptomology irrespective of spousal support and male partner's perceived racial discrimination was predictive of depressive symptomology only among men with low levels of spousal support. No partner effects were present. The results demonstrate the need to examine variability in social stress and mental health outcomes for those in close relationships. ?? ??????????????????????????,????????????????????,???487????????????????????????????????????????????,????????,???????????????????;???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Resumen La teoria sobre el estres social propone que el estres resultante de la posicion social de una persona en la sociedad conduce al desarrollo de menos recursos de afrontamiento y ulteriormente produce un aumento de los problemas de salud mental. Guiados por este marco, investigamos si la relacion entre la discriminacion percibida y los sintomas depresivos estuvo moderada por el apoyo social conyugal en una muestra de 487 parejas heterosexuales afroamericanas. Utilizando el modelo de interdependencia actor-pareja, los resultados sugirieron que la discriminacion racial percibida de la pareja femenina predijo su sintomatologia depresiva independientemente del apoyo conyugal recibido y que la discriminacion racial percibida de la pareja masculina predijo la sintomatologia depresiva solo entre los hombres con niveles bajos de apoyo conyugal. No hubo efectos en los integrantes de las parejas. Los resultados demuestran la necesidad de examinar la variabilidad de los resultados relacionados con el estres social y la salud mental para aquellas personas que tienen relaciones estrechas.