Self-Reported Depression in Collegiate Athletes: The Effect of Privacy on Symptom Disclosure

Abstract

Prevalence studies on depressive symptoms in collegiate athletes have yielded varied estimations, which may be due, in part, to survey administration privacy. However, the influence of survey administration privacy (i.e., anonymous and confidential) on depressive symptom disclosure remains unknown in sport. The purposes of the current study, therefore, were twofold: (a) compare depressive symptoms reported under high- and low-privacy conditions and (b) examine factors associated with underreporting (i.e., social desirability). College athletes (N = 123) were randomly assigned to high- and low-privacy conditions. Results indicated no significant difference, F(1, 120) = 0.59, p = .446, between the prevalence of depressive symptoms reported across conditions when controlling for sex, and no significant correlation between depressive symptoms and social desirability (r = −.01, p = .886). Taken together, results indicated that survey administration privacy did not impact depressive symptom disclosure in the current sample.