ADOLESCENT WELL-BEING: THE ROLE OF GENDER, MENTAL HEALTH ATTITUDES AND HELP-SEEKING BEHAVIORS IN SLOVENIAN STUDENTS

Well-being is shaped by a range of factors, including personal characteristics (e.g., gender, age), internal factors (e.g.individual needs, emotions and traits) and external influences such as family and peer support systems.Given the notable decline in well-being during adolescence -particularly among girls and those from economically disadvantaged backgrounds (Michel et al., 2009;Yoon et al., 2023) -it is crucial to identify and understand its predictors.This study aimed to investigate the predictors of well-being among a sample of 39 Slovenian primary school students (Mage = 14 years; 48.7% male).Specifically, the role of gender, attitudes towards mental health, help-seeking intentions and perceived barriers to help-seeking were examined.Participants completed the Short Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale (SWEMBS), the Mental Health Literacy Scale (MHLS), the General Help-Seeking Questionnaire (GHSQ) and the Barriers to Adolescent Help-Seeking (BASH).Hierarchical regression analysis, with mental well-being as the dependent variable, revealed that gender was a significant predictor in model 1, accounting for 15.2% of the variance.However, when two dimensions of attitudes towards mental health were included in model 2 (attitudes towards people with mental health problems; general attitudes towards mental health problems and help-seeking), the explained variance did not increase significantly and none of the predictors reached statistical significance.Model 3, which also included help-seeking intentions and belief-based barriers, explained the largest proportion of variance (R = .540,p < .001)and identified general attitudes toward mental health problems and help-seeking, help-seeking intentions, and belief-based barriers to help-seeking as significant predictors.The results suggest that while gender is initially associated with mental well-being, attitudes and behavioural intentions have a more substantial impact.Higher help-seeking intentions were associated with better well-being, whereas perceived barriers to help-seeking negatively predicted well-being.The negative association between positive mental health attitudes and well-being suggests a complex relationship that requires further investigation (e.g., possible moderating factors: personal experience with mental health issues).These findings suggest that further research is needed to explore these dynamics in more detail, particularly in relation to interventions that promote positive attitudes and help-seeking behaviours in young people.Future research should address the study's limitations using larger and more diverse samples, longitudinal designs, and mixed methods approaches.