About this poster

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Panel information
Panel 1. Context: Cross-Cultural, Neighborhood, and Social

Abstract

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Purpose: Social support has been identified as an important protective factor against mental health struggles for racially minoritized adolescents, including Asian Americans. However, extant research has not sufficiently examined the collective impact of multiple sources of social support or how the protective effects of social support fluctuate over time across adolescent developmental stages. This study is the first to our knowledge to examine the longitudinal effects of social support from family, religious organizations, and school on the mental health of Filipino American (FA) and Korean American (KA) adolescents, over the 4-year study period. We also explored how the effects of social support over time vary by the adolescent developmental stages, i.e., the early adolescence cohort group (middle schoolers at baseline) vs. the middle adolescence cohort group (high schoolers at baseline).

Methods: Data are from the Midwest Longitudinal Study of Asian American Families project, a longitudinal survey of FA and KA youth and their parents living in the Chicago metropolitan area. This study used three waves of youth data. The first wave was collected in 2014 from 378 FA and 408 KA youth (N=786). Stepwise mixed effects regression models were used to examine: (1) the impact of social support from family, religious organization, and school on depressive symptoms and suicidal thoughts, (2) two-way interaction effects (support × wave and support × developmental stage) and (3) three-way interaction effects (support × wave × developmental stage).

Results:
All sources of social support predicted lower depressive symptoms in the FA group, while in the KA group, this was the case for family and school support. For the FA group, family support was associated with lower suicidal thoughts, whereas in the KA group, it was school support that showed this association. The two-way interaction effects models revealed that school support was associated with fewer depressive symptoms, as shown in Figure 1. This relationship was stronger for the KA early adolescence cohort group compared to the middle adolescence cohort. Regarding the three-way interaction models, depressive symptoms increased over time in the FA early adolescence cohort, regardless of the level of religious support. However, the protective effect of religious support on depressive symptoms was stronger for those reporting higher (vs. lower) religious support (Figure 2).

Conclusions/Implications: Asian American adolescents, navigating the complexities of their immigrant heritage and minoritized status, encounter distinct challenges that can increase mental distress with age. Existing research has not adequately explored the most beneficial sources of support during this pivotal period. Our study seeks to identify the critical role of social support, revealing the particular importance of family support for both FA and KA adolescents. Findings also emphasize the importance of religious support for younger FA adolescents and the role of school support for younger adolescents in both ethnic groups. Future research would benefit from exploring the factors that explain observed differences in support levels and significance across FA and KA adolescents. It should also examine how diverse support systems can bolster the mental health of minoritized adolescents as they advance toward adulthood.

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