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Emotional Distress, Drinking, and Academic Achievement Across the Adolescent Life Course

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Abstract

Our study of the adolescent life course proposes that substantial maturation occurs within three intertwined arenas of development: the social, the psychological, and the normative attainment. Further, each arena may be linked, respectively, to three youth problem dimensions: drinking, depressive affect, and academic achievement. We use latent growth curves and the Youth Development Study (effective N = 856) to track a panel of teens from their freshman to senior year in high school. There are 54.4% girls and 45.6% boys, and 75.7% non-Hispanic whites and 24.3% other races/ethnicities. Two research goals are addressed: (1) estimate each dimension’s unique developmental trajectory across high school, and (2) model the dimensions together in order to assess their reciprocal influences. While mean levels in all three dimensions increased over time, distinct developmental patterns were observed, especially in drinking and depression. For example, more drinking occasions—a social activity for most teens—may help assuage some teens’ emotional distress, especially girls’. These patterns suggest a synergistic relationship between the social and psychological arenas of development. Contrary to expectation, higher freshman depressive affect was associated with a significantly sharper increase in GPA over time for girls.

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Notes

  1. The RMSEA assesses how well a model with unknown though optimally chosen parameter estimates would fit the population covariance matrix (Browne and Cudeck 1993). Values below .08 but especially below .06 indicate a well-fitting model (Browne and Cudeck 1993; Hu and Bentler 1999). The CFI ranges from 0 (no fit) to 1.00 (excellent fit) and compares a hypothesized model with an independence model. The IFI compares the discrepancy and the degrees of freedom for the theoretical model to the discrepancy and the degrees of freedom for the baseline model. Values close to 1 indicate a very good fit.

  2. However, this does not mean the complete lack of a substantively meaningful effect among girls; rather, coupled with a significant slope variance, it suggests that even though no meaningful average, or group-level, change was observed for girls, there was nonetheless significant individual variation in change among girls.

  3. Alternatively, this suggests those who had steeper increases in depressive affect “stabled out” (i.e., reached the top of the quadratic curve) more quickly than those with a less steep linear depression slope.

  4. The negative covariance must be read in the variables’ original metrics. Since both increase over time, a negative covariance speaks to the less steep increase over time.

  5. In our data, the mean correlation between depressive affect and self-deprecation across the high school years is .545 (p < .01).

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank the principal investigator of the Youth Development Study, Jeylan T. Mortimer, for use of the data. The Youth Development Study was supported by Grant Number R01HD044138 from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development or the National Institutes of Health. The Youth Development Study was previously supported by the National Institute of Mental Health. We are also grateful to Kenneth F. Ferraro, Jeylan T. Mortimer, Sarah A. Mustillo, and Angie Andriot for critical readings of earlier drafts.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Sociology, Center for Aging and the Life Course, Purdue University, 700 West State Street, West Lafayette, IN, 47907-2059, USA

    Timothy J. Owens & Nathan D. Shippee

  2. Section of Adolescent Medicine, School of Medicine, Indiana University, 410 West 10th Street, Room 1001, Indianapolis, IN, 46202, USA

    Devon J. Hensel

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  1. Timothy J. Owens
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  2. Nathan D. Shippee
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  3. Devon J. Hensel
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Correspondence to Timothy J. Owens.

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An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 2007 meetings of the American Sociological Association.

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Owens, T.J., Shippee, N.D. & Hensel, D.J. Emotional Distress, Drinking, and Academic Achievement Across the Adolescent Life Course. J Youth Adolescence 37, 1242–1256 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-008-9319-2

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