Association of psychosocial factors at home with depression, anxiety and stress among adolescents in Srinagar Uttarakhand. A cross-sectional study

Background: Globally, one in seven 10-19-year-olds experiences a mental disorder, accounting for 13% of the global burden of disease in this age group. Mental health of adolescents not only affects overall health at present but also has great impact on future life. Family interactions at home play indispensable role in mental health and overall development of adolescents. Methods and Material: Present cross-sectional study was conducted among 440 adolescents by using DASS 21 scale and interviewing them using a structured pretested questionnaire assessing psychosocial factors at home. Data analysis was done with help of SPSS version 21. Multivariate logistic regression was used to find predictors of depression, anxiety and stress. Results: Of 440 study adolescents, depression, anxiety and stress was respectively present among 58.9%, 69% and 43.40%. There is a statistically highly significant association between gender and different severity grades of depression (p-value= 0.001), anxiety (p-value <0.001) and stress (p-value = 0.004). Multivariate analysis using logistic regression revealed that students having frequent arguments with parents/family members were 1.97 times more likely to have depression compared to students responding no arguments with parents/family members (AOR=1.97 95%CI (1.29-3.01), p value=0.002). Other important predictors for depression are ‘worry about their privacy at home’ and ‘want to run away from home’. Highly significant predictors for anxiety on multivariate analysis were unsupportive parents and worry about financial problems at home. Conclusion: Moderate, severe and extremely severe depression as well as anxiety are significantly higher among females compared to males. There is a need for improving assessed significant predictors at home by counselling parents, other family members and adolescents.