Allgood-Merton, B., Lewinsohn, P.M., Hops, H. (1990, February). Sex differences and adolescent depression. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 99(1), 55-61.
OVERVIEW
A number of studies have consistently found that, in adolescence, there is an increase in female depression and a decrease in male depression (Gjerde). Also, several studies show negative body image as a correlate of depression in high school and college students. In one study analyzing body image as a predictor of girls’ depression, grade six through nine girls were tested, and it was found that body image contributes to the "persistence" of depression (Rierdan). In a paper presented at the Annual Conference of the National Association for Women Deans, Administrators, and Counselors, Leslie McBride said that the emphasis on slenderness—coming from the media, a middle- and upper-class preoccupation with fitness, and the image promoted by the women’s movement—has horribly affected females who deal with a negative body image, a poor self-concept, and depression. In fact, as the "ideal female weight" has been decreasing, the real female weight average has been increasing (McBride). Adolescent women are in turmoil.
The test at hand resulted from all such knowledge. Young women, beginning in adolescence, are depressed into their adulthood. The purpose of this study was "to explore psychosocial factors hypothesized to be associated with depressive symptoms in adolescence and with the female preponderance thought to emerge during this period." Factors included sex, age, self-esteem, stressful recent events, body image, self-consciousness, and "the degree to which an adolescent self-reports attributes associated with masculine stereotypes." The following hypotheses were submitted: the above factors will be correlated with depression and be contributed to the pronounced female depression of adolescence.
The study notes that "Boys are culturally reinforced for learning active, instrumental behaviors, girls are not; as a consequence, women are likely to develop a less active coping style than men and to perceive themselves as less resourceful and self efficacious."
DESIGN
Participants in the study were ninth through twelfth grade students, mostly white, of middle- to upper-middle economic status, and suburban. They evenly spanned the age range, yet more girls were involved than boys. Two tests were performed—one month apart—with 802 teens the first time and 686 the second. Participants were given self-report questionnaires. An assessment battery tested for each factor.
FINDINGS
Effects due to gender were found in every area. Girls in every age group reported more symptoms of depression, less satisfaction with their appearance on three different measures of body image, and significantly lower self-esteem. "Girls were more aware of their inner states, more self-reflective, more publicly self-conscious, and had greater social anxiety than did boys." Girls also reported many more stressful recent events and attained lower masculinity and higher femininity scores.
On the CES-D, a measure for depression, more boys scored below the mean, and more girls above it. Of the seventeen per cent scoring in the "extremely high range," girls outnumbered boys two to one.
Low self-esteem, negative body image, recent stressful events, a low number of masculine attributes, and self-consciousness correlated with depression. Recent life events correlated with depression for both girls and boys, but "the relationship between body image and self esteem was significantly stronger for girls than for boys..." A test was also performed in which all the variables for which a gender difference was found were controlled. This step greatly reduced the gender effect. In other words, if girls and boys have the same number of contributing factors, their levels of depression will be much the same.
CONCLUSIONS
- Neither the depression nor the difference between the genders in the rate of depression increases with age. Thus, there is a sharp increase in gender-effect and prevalence occurring before high school. Studies dealing with fifth through eighth graders are therefore crucial.
- Like adults, adolescents’ self-esteem correlates with depression. Stressful recent events correlate with and facilitate depression, as hypothesized. It has been observed that a stressor tends to lead to depression one month later.
- Body image seems to comprise a huge portion of self-esteem, especially for girls. It is an all-important correlate and cause of depression. Girls scored low on masculine instrumentality, as was expected, but this factors in for both sexes. Self-consciousness apparently accompanies, but does not cause, depression.
- The researchers believe that the differences between the sexes—females being more depressed, more self-conscious, having more feminine attributes, having more recent stressful events, and having more negative body image/self-esteem—is indicative of the adolescent female experience.
- "Clearly the most important variables in reducing the sex difference were body image and self esteem...these results suggest that if adolescent girls felt as physically attractive, effective, and generally good about themselves as their male peers did, they would not experience so much depression..."
- Being low in the self-efficacious, instrumental attributes (masculinity scale) makes all the difference. Note the researchers, "...girls feel more helpless, hopeless, and stressed than boys do."
CRITIQUE AND EVALUATION
It is easy to see that boys and girls are conditioned very differently: girls are conditioned to be helpless and reliant upon men; boys are conditioned to accomplish and be self-sufficient. Girls are often taught to focus on boys, and they are told to physically appear as the media dictates in order to capture the boys’ attention. These variables can understandably depress an adolescent female.
IMPLICATIONS
This study suggests that body image and self-esteem cause and correlate with female depression. Youth leaders should find out why body image depresses girls, but not boys. Girls feel pressure to be built like supermodels, while boys are not compelled to achieve the same image.
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