How Can We Prevent out-of-School Adolescents from Being Depression?

Background and Purpose: Adolescence is a rapid developmental period that promotes physical maturation and psychological changes through the interplay of personal characteristics and the surrounding ecology (Chan et al., 2022). However, out-of-school adolescents will encounter negative psychological and emotional problems, such as alienation, anxiety and powerlessness because the school social safety net no longer exists for them (Ami & Sunk, 2014). Therefore, the study examined the effects of various sources of social support (i.e., parent support, peer support, and significant others support) among out-of-school adolescents on their levels of depression, and the mediating effect of self-esteem.

Method: A total of 682 questionnaires were collected from South Korean out-of-school adolescents. The study used the following scales to measure the levels of depression, social support, and self-esteem among the out-of-school adolescents, and the reliability of each is as follows. Firstly, the Symptom Checklist-90-Revision(SCL-90-R) was used as the depression scale(α=.908). Secondly, the multidimensional social support scale was used as the social support scale(α=.937), Thirdly, Rosenberg's self-esteem scale was used as the self-esteem scale(α=.908). The research hypotheses of the study were tested using structural equation modelling.

Results: The structural model demonstrated a good fit with the data, χ² = 1962.12 (p < .001), RMSEA = .065 (90%CI [.062, .068]), CFI = .91, TLI = .90, IFI = .91. Specifically, social support from significant others in out-of-school youth had a significant impact on their self-esteem (β=.29, p<.01), which in turn had a significant negative impact on their depression (β=.-54, p<.01). In addition, as a result of testing whether the self-esteem of out-of-school youth had a mediating effect in the relationship between their social support and depression, it was found that the indirect effects of social support on depression through self-esteem (Effect=-.16, SE=.06, 95%CI [-.29, -.04], excluding 0) was significant, accounting for 15.6% of the total effect.

Conclusions and Implications: The results were found that the significant others support was significantly associated with the levels of depression via the mediating effect of self-esteem. The findings suggest that enhancing self-esteem and individualized social support should be emphasized in preventing or intervening depression among out-of-school adolescents in South Korea.