Pathways of Depression and Substance Use from Childhood to Young Adulthood: A Longitudinal Analysis

Sasanka Boro, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)
Nandita Saikia, International Institute for Population Sciences

Substance use and depression frequently co-occur in adolescence. This paper examines the bidirectional relationship between substance use and depressive symptoms from adolescence to young adulthood, focusing on differences by sex in lower socio-economic settings in India. We utilised Understanding the lives of adolescents and young adults (UDAYA) survey dataset. Depression was assessed using PHQ12 scale, having higher internal validity (?=0.86). Univariate, Bivariate and multivariate analysis adopting a negative binomial regression model was used. The study demonstrated higher mean depression score among educated, girls, and adolescents who consumed substance. Increases in depressive symptoms were significantly associated with a later increase of about a half in drugs for males and nearly a two times increase in tobacco consumption for females. Conversely, increased smoking frequency were significantly associated with a 0.6-point increase for females and 0.4 point increase for males in depressive symptoms at later wave. Results indicate a bidirectional relationship between smoking and depressive symptoms for females. For males, there was evidence supporting self-medication with marijuana and for smoking being associated with increases in depression. Results inform how substance use and depression screening, prevention and treatment efforts should be paired and targeted for males and females.

Keywords: Children, Adolescents, and Youth, Gender Dynamics, Health and Morbidity, Population Policies

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