Depression among Adolescents

Depression
among Adolescents

Adama
Zoure

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Psy
4910-C2

03/29/2020

Depression
among Adolescents

Introduction

Depression
is a mental health disorder that affects approximately 3.2 million
adolescents between age 12 and 17 experience at least one significant
bout in the United States (“Major Depression,” n.d.). Depression
is prevalent among adolescents due to puberty, cognitive, emotional,
and physical changes. This research proposal intends to investigate
the effects of depression on the relationship between parents and
adolescents. The proposal will achieve this aim by examining how
alcohol abuse among adolescents results in depression, thus affecting
parent-adolescent relationships. Secondly, the study will establish
the personal experiences that drive adolescents into depression
leading to poor relations between adolescents and parents. Thirdly,
the study will investigate which comorbid disorders cause depression
among adolescents, thus causing poor relationships between them and
their parents. Lastly, the study will analyze the role that social
isolation plays in depression among adolescents leading to deficient
parent-adolescent relationships. The study will achieve its aims by
incorporating secondary research from reputable journals, books,
websites, and other essential resources. Also, the study will utilize
interviews where ten adolescents and five parent participants will be
selected. Consecutively, the research will gather information from
the participants through questionnaires and interviews that will be
recorded. The recorded data will be examined in phenomenological to
assess its commonality. Hopefully, the analyzed data will explain the
factors that lead to depression among adolescents so that researchers
can use the results to find a solution for the effects of depression
on parent-adolescent relationships.

Problem
Statement

Depression
among adolescents is now a common phenomenon that now affects
approximately 37 percent of young people who report a recent
incidence of clinical depression (“Depression Rates Growing,”
2016). Clinical depression is characterized by disinterest in
day-to-day activities accompanied with other depression symptoms that
persist for not less than a fortnight. Based on a study that was
undertaken by 176,245 adolescents, 8.7 percent reported incidences of
clinical depression symptoms over one year (“Depression Rates
Growing,” 2016). Another study conducted in 2017 shows that
approximately 2.3 million adolescents in America displayed not less
than one major bout of a depressive episode with critical impairment
(“Major Depression,” n.d.). This number represented 9.4% of the
country’s population between the age of 12 and 17.

These
numbers show that depression is prevalent among adolescents. Although
this disorder directly affects adolescents, it also influences the
life of the people around them. The people that are affected most by
depression among adolescents are their parents. Adolescent depression
results in stress to the parents and family members during the onset
and recovery as they try to care for the depressed individual.
Parents and family members of a depressed adolescent demonstrate a
higher occurrence of mental health problems and depressive symptoms.
Also, they may experience high levels of anger, fatigue, stress,
helplessness, and even guilt. Parents who experience severe stress
are reported to show symptoms of decreased mental health performance.
These symptoms are such as a reduced attention span and impaired
memory function (“How Does Depression Affect,” n.d.).

.

The
emotions of parents are also affected as they often feel guilty,
angry, or confused due to the behavioral and emotional changes that
they witness while taking care of depressed adolescents. These
emotional changes in parents and family members may cause the
affected adolescent to feel a reduction of affection, thus further
ruining the parent-teenager relationship. Other effects that
adolescent depression has on parents are a constant worry, a loss of
identity, uncertainty, and reduction in self-esteem (“How Does
Depression Affect”, n.d.). This research study will evaluate the
subject of adolescent depression and how it influences
parent-adolescent relationships. There have been studies on how
depression among parents influences parent-child relationships, but
research on how teenage depression affects parent-adolescent
relationships is limited. This research aims at filling this gap by
rigorously assessing how adolescent depression affects the
relationship between the parents and the affected teenagers.

Research
Question and Hypothesis

What
role do isolation, subjective experiences, alcohol abuse, and
comorbid disorders play in causing depression among adolescents that
leads to poor parent-adolescent relationships? It is hypothesized
that isolation, alcohol abuse, comorbid behaviors, and subjective
experiences result in depression among adolescents, thus resulting in
substandard relationships between depressed adolescents and their
parents.

References

Depression
Rates Growing Among Adolescents, Particularly Girls. (2016).
Retrieved from:
https://www.jhsph.edu/news/news-releases/2016/depression-rates-growing-among-adolescents-particularly-girls.html

How
Does Depression Affect Those Around You? (n.d.). Retrieved from:
https://achievetms.com/depression-affects-those-around-you/

Major
Depression. (n.d.). Retrieved from:
https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/major-depression.shtml

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