Prevalence and Correlates of Depressive Symptoms Among High School Adolescent Girls in Southern Uganda

Abstract

BackgroundIn sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), adolescent girls and young women are three times more likely than boys to have depressive disorders. Understanding adolescents’ unique and common vulnerabilities and protective factors is essential for the development of appropriate interventions and programming focused on child and adolescent mental health. This paper examines the prevalence and predictors of depressive symptoms among high school adolescent girls in southern Uganda.MethodsBaseline data from 1260 adolescent girls (14–17 years), recruited from 47 secondary schools were utilized. Depressive symptoms were estimated using the 21-item Beck’s Depression Inventory. Hierarchical linear regression modelling was utilized to estimate key predictors of depressive symptoms among adolescent girls.ResultsOf the total sample, 16.35% (n = 206) reported severe depressive symptoms and almost one in every three adolescent girls interviewed (29.68%, n = 374) reported moderate symptoms. These symptoms were more prevalent among older adolescents (16 years and above). In addition, family relationships, social support, as well as measures of psychological wellbeing (self-concept and self-esteem) were all associated with lower levels of depressive symptoms. Hopelessness was associated with higher levels of depressive symptoms among adolescent girls.ConclusionFindings from this study contribute to the limited literature on the prevalence of depressive symptoms among adolescent girls. Given that depressive symptoms tend to increase during later adolescence, our findings support increasing calls for early screening and detection of poor mental health functioning to facilitate timely referral to care and treatment. Findings may also inform the development and incorporation of gender-specific mental health components in programming targeting adolescent girls, in low-resource communities in SSA.Trial Registration:This trial was registered with ClinicalTrials.gov (registration number: NCT03307226) on 11 October 2017.

Psychological Distress in Adolescents: Prevalence and its Relation to High Risk Behaviors Among Secondary School Students in Uganda.

“…In addition, students in boarding schools and schools with both genders tend to report more cases of psychological distress, nonetheless, this is contrary to another study where students in single-sex schools had higher odds of psychological distress (14). Contrary to existing studies; gender, social support and academic performance were not associated with psychological distress in this study (7,10,14,27,33,46,47).…”

“…Generally, previous studies have shown a high prevalence of mental health issues such as anxiety and depression among adolescents in Ugandan. A recent study conducted among high school adolescent girls in Southern Uganda revealed that the prevalence of depressive symptoms ranged from 16-29% among the study participants (27). Another study conducted among secondary school students in Central Uganda indicated that 21% had signi cant depression symptoms (14).…”

“…Meanwhile, previous studies in Uganda have focused on other mental health problems with no study conducted on psychological distress in adolescents. In addition, prior studies on adolescent mental health were centered on adolescent living with HIV/AIDS, vulnerable and marginalized population (13,14,17,(27)(28)(29). Hence, this study aimed at estimating the prevalence of psychological distress and its relationship with high risk behaviors among secondary school students in Uganda.…”