IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jscscx/v7y2018i5p72-d143084.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Multi-Level Analysis on School Connectedness, Family Support, and Adolescent Depression: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, 1995–1996

Author

Listed:
  • Lin Zhu

    (Center for Asian Health, Lewis Katz School of Medicine, Temple University, 3440 N Broad St., Kresge Bldg, Ste. 320, Philadelphia, PA 19140, USA)

Abstract

Objective : The purpose of this study is to gain insight into the effect of family support, school connectedness, and school environments on depressive symptoms among adolescents across racial/ethnic groups on both the student-level and school-level. Method : This study uses a sample of 4228 students (2122 girls and 2016 boys) from the public use data of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. Students were measured at two time points (one year apart) on school connectedness, family support, socio-demographic factors, and the Center for Epidemiological Studies’ Depression Scale. Hierarchical Linear Modeling was used to examine potential predictors on adolescent depressive symptoms. This is, to the best of the author’s knowledge, the first study to examine the interplay of school connectedness, school racial composition, and adolescent depression. Results : School connectedness partially mediates the effects of family support on depressive symptoms, but both remain strong predictors of depressive symptoms. African American adolescents are the only racial/ethnic group that has constantly higher CES-D scores than the non-Hispanic white adolescents. School-level connectedness is positively related to students’ depressive symptoms. The racial composition of a school has different effects on students’ depressive symptoms on student’s race. Conclusions : Low perceived family support, low school connectedness, being female, and being African American are consistently associated with greater depressive symptoms one year later. The overall level of school connectedness of a school is found to be related with greater individual student’s depressive symptoms, while the effects of school proportion of minority students on students’ depressive symptoms differ significantly across the race/ethnicity of students. Future study is needed to explore the association between racial/ethnic segregation and adolescent depression while considering students’ racial/ethnic status.

Suggested Citation

  • Lin Zhu, 2018. "A Multi-Level Analysis on School Connectedness, Family Support, and Adolescent Depression: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, 1995–1996," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 7(5), pages 1-16, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:7:y:2018:i:5:p:72-:d:143084
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/7/5/72/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/7/5/72/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lin Zhu, 2017. "Depression Risks and Correlates among Different Generations of Chinese Americans: The Effects of Relationships with Friends and Relatives," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 6(2), pages 1-18, June.
    2. Joyce, Hilary D. & Early, Theresa J., 2014. "The impact of school connectedness and teacher support on depressive symptoms in adolescents: A multilevel analysis," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 101-107.
    3. Ross, Catherine E. & Mirowsky, John, 2006. "Sex differences in the effect of education on depression: Resource multiplication or resource substitution?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 63(5), pages 1400-1413, September.
    4. Walsemann, Katrina M. & Bell, Bethany A. & Maitra, Debeshi, 2011. "The intersection of school racial composition and student race/ethnicity on adolescent depressive and somatic symptoms," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 72(11), pages 1873-1883, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Cherier Mae G. Logroño & Celso L. Tagadiad, 2023. "Instructional Leadership and Ethical Climate as Determinants of School Connectedness," International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science, International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS), vol. 7(1), pages 750-769, January.
    2. Maria Jones & Marit Råbu & Jan Ivar Røssberg & Randi Ulberg, 2020. "Therapists’ Experiences of Psychodynamic Therapy with and without Transference Interventions for Adolescents with Depression," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(13), pages 1-18, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Torres, Jacqueline M. & Yahirun, Jenjira J. & Sheehan, Connor & Ma, Mingming & Sáenz, Joseph, 2021. "Adult child socio-economic status disadvantage and cognitive decline among older parents in Mexico," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 279(C).
    2. Jennifer Karas Montez & Kaitlyn Barnes, 2016. "The Benefits of Educational Attainment for U.S. Adult Mortality: Are they Contingent on the Broader Environment?," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 35(1), pages 73-100, February.
    3. Dudovitz, R.N. & Biely, C. & Barnert, E.S. & Coker, T.R. & Guerrero, A.D. & Jackson, N. & Schickedanz, A. & Szilagyi, P.G. & Iyer, S. & Chung, P.J., 2021. "Association between school racial/ethnic composition during adolescence and adult health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 272(C).
    4. Jeon, HyeSook & Lee, Serim & Lee, Jieun & Chun, JongSerl, 2020. "Impacts of multilevel factors on depressive symptoms among adolescents in South Korea," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    5. Elliot M. Friedman & Elizabeth Teas, 2023. "Self-Rated Health and Mortality: Moderation by Purpose in Life," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(12), pages 1-14, June.
    6. Bradby, Hannah, 2012. "Race, ethnicity and health: The costs and benefits of conceptualising racism and ethnicity," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 75(6), pages 955-958.
    7. Mandemakers, Jornt J. & Monden, Christiaan W.S., 2010. "Does education buffer the impact of disability on psychological distress?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 288-297, July.
    8. Sze Yan Liu & Jennifer J Manly & Benjamin D Capistrant & M Maria Glymour, 2015. "Historical Differences in School Term Length and Measured Blood Pressure: Contributions to Persistent Racial Disparities among US-Born Adults," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(6), pages 1-13, June.
    9. Hannelore De Grande & Hadewijch Vandenheede & Patrick Deboosere, 2015. "Educational Inequalities in the Transition to Adulthood in Belgium: The Impact of Intergenerational Mobility on Young-Adult Mortality in 2001-2009," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(12), pages 1-18, December.
    10. Bahadır Dursun & Resul Cesur, 2016. "Transforming lives: the impact of compulsory schooling on hope and happiness," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 29(3), pages 911-956, July.
    11. Terrence D. Hill & Jason A. Ford & Harvey L. Nicholson, 2022. "Education and polypharmacy: A national study of racial and ethnic variations," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 103(7), pages 1687-1705, December.
    12. Kamryn S. Morris & Eleanor K. Seaton & Masumi Iida & Sarah Lindstrom Johnson, 2020. "Racial Discrimination Stress, School Belonging, and School Racial Composition on Academic Attitudes and Beliefs among Black Youth," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 9(11), pages 1-20, October.
    13. Hill, Susan M. & Byrne, Matthew F. & Wenden, Elizabeth & Devine, Amanda & Miller, Margaret & Quinlan, Henrietta & Cross, Donna & Eastham, Judy & Chester, Miranda, 2023. "Models of school breakfast program implementation in Western Australia and the implications for supporting disadvantaged students," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).
    14. Van de Velde, Sarah & Bracke, Piet & Levecque, Katia, 2010. "Gender differences in depression in 23 European countries. Cross-national variation in the gender gap in depression," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 305-313, July.
    15. Bjelland, Ingvar & Krokstad, Steinar & Mykletun, Arnstein & Dahl, Alv A. & Tell, Grethe S. & Tambs, K., 2008. "Does a higher educational level protect against anxiety and depression? The HUNT study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(6), pages 1334-1345, March.
    16. Matthew A. Andersson & Vida Maralani & Renae Wilkinson, 2022. "Origins and Destinations, but How Much and When? Educational Disparities in Smoking and Drinking Across Adolescence and Young Adulthood," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 41(2), pages 521-558, April.
    17. Korous, Kevin M. & Surachman, Agus & Rogers, Charles R. & Cuevas, Adolfo G., 2023. "Parental education and epigenetic aging in middle-aged and older adults in the United States: A life course perspective," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 333(C).
    18. Sara Pinillos-Franco & Carmen García-Prieto, 2017. "The gender gap in self-rated health and education in Spain. A multilevel analysis," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(12), pages 1-11, December.
    19. Eui Kyung Kim & Michael J. Furlong & Erin Dowdy, 2019. "Adolescents’ Personality Traits and Positive Psychological Orientations: Relations with Emotional Distress and Life Satisfaction Mediated by School Connectedness," Child Indicators Research, Springer;The International Society of Child Indicators (ISCI), vol. 12(6), pages 1951-1969, December.
    20. Ringdal, Charlotte & Rootjes, Frank, 2022. "Depression and labor supply: Evidence from the Netherlands," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 45(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:7:y:2018:i:5:p:72-:d:143084. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.