Research on adolescent well-being has shown that students with depression have an increased risk of facing academic failure, yet few studies have looked at the implications of adolescent depression in the process of school dropout. This study examined mediation processes linking depression symptoms, self-perceived academic competence, and self-reported achievement in 7th grade to dropping out of school in later adolescence. We followed 493 (228 girls and 265 boys) French-speaking adolescents fi-om low-socioeconomic-status secondary schools in Montreal (Quebec, Canada) for 6 years. Almost 34% of participants dropped out of school during this period. Findings indicated that self-reported depression symptoms in 7th grade increased the risk of dropping out of school in later adolescence. Structural equation modeling revealed that the predictive relationship between depression symptoms and school dropout was mediated by self-perceptions of academic competence. Current findings provide support for self-perceptions of competence as mediational processes in the relationship between adolescent depression symptoms and early school leaving.

The relationship between grade retention and adolescent depression in the course of school dropout is poorly understood. Improving knowledge of the mechanisms involving these variables would shed light on at-risk youth development. This study examines whether depression in adolescence moderates the relationship between grade retention and school dropout in a high-risk sample. Seventh-grade students (n = 453) from two low-SES secondary schools in Montreal (Quebec, Canada) were followed from 2000 to 2006. Self-reported lifetime and seventh-grade depression were measured with the Inventory to Diagnose Depression. Primary school grade retention, and secondary school dropout status was obtained through the Ministry of Education of Quebec registries. Sixteen percent of participants reported lifetime depression, and 13% reported depression in seventh-grade. Nearly one third (32%) of the sample dropped out of school. Logistic regression models were used to estimate moderation effects predicting school dropout six years later. Findings indicated that students with grade retention were 5.54 times more likely to drop out of school. Depression in seventh grade increased by 2.75 times the likelihood of school dropout. The probability of dropping out for adolescents combining both grade retention and seventh-grade depression was 7.26 times higher than it was for those reporting grade retention only. The moderating effect of depression was similar for boys and girls. Depression is a significant vulnerability factor of low educational attainment aggravating the risk associated with grade retention. Experiencing depression at the beginning of secondary school can interfere with school perseverance particularly for students who experienced early academic failure.

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Plusieurs travaux ont montré que les sentiments dépressifs chez les adolescents sont associés aux problèmes scolaires (faible rendement, désengagement, absentéisme, etc.). Et certains auteurs suggèrent qu’une partie importante des jeunes qui abandonnent leurs études souffriraient de troubles intériorisés tels que la dépression. Cependant, aucune étude à ce jour ne s’est penchée sur le lien entre la dépression et le décrochage scolaire de manière longitudinale. Cette étude vise donc à vérifier l’impact prédictif de la dépression sur le décrochage. Notre échantillon se compose de 139 adolescents montréalais (60 filles; 79 garçons), en moyenne âgés de 15,1 ans. Les participants, issus de milieux défavorisés, fréquentaient des classes de la 1re à la 5e secondaire au secteur régulier ou adapté. Ils ont été suivis durant 15 mois et 28 % d’entre eux ont décroché pendant l’étude (39 décrocheurs; 100 non-décrocheurs). La dépression a été mesurée avec l’inventaire de dépression de Beck. Nos résultats, obtenus à l’aide d’analyses de régression logistiques, montrent que la dépression est un facteur de risque du décrochage scolaire dont l’impact s’additionne à celui d’autres facteurs de risque socioéconomiques (scolarité des parents), individuels (âge, genre) et scolaires (risque de décrocher, indiscipline). De plus, nos résultats montrent que l’impact de la dépression est modéré par le genre des participants : la dépression a un impact plus important sur le décrochage scolaire chez les garçons que chez les filles. La discussion explore des hypothèses explicatives sur la plus grande vulnérabilité des garçons à décrocher lorsqu’ils font face à des problèmes intériorisés.