Social connectedness, sleep, physical activity contribute to better mental health among teens during COVID-19

While the pandemic has affected everyone, physically and mentally, alike, it has had a permanent impact on young children and adolescents, who have had to stay in lockdown and miss out on much of their school life. However, a recent study has good news. The research, published in the Journal of Adolescent Health, had data from a longitudinal survey of more than 3,000 adolescents aged 11 to 14 registered before and during the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. The survey found that Supportive relationships with family and friends and healthy behaviors, such as physical activity and better sleep, seemed to protect against the deleterious effects of the pandemic on adolescent mental health.

The research is based on data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study, the largest long-term study of brain development and childhood health ever conducted in the United States. The researchers also explored predictors of perceived stress, anxiety, and depressive symptoms, finding that girls were more likely than boys to experience psychological distress during the pandemic. Psychosocial factors, including poorer quality and functioning of family relationships, more screen time, and witnessing discrimination in relation to the pandemic, also predicted youth distress.

“Early adolescence is a time when young people are already experiencing rapid physical, emotional and social changes, and the COVID-19 pandemic has caused great disruption to this sensitive stage of life,” said Nora D. Volkow, MD, director of NIDA. “This study helps us understand how modifiable lifestyle factors affect adolescent mental health and well-being, and may inform the development of interventions to protect youth during major life stress. This is important now.” as we continue to deal with the pandemic, and also in future crisis responses at the local or national level.”

In this study, researchers analyzed data from a longitudinal cohort of more than 3,000 ABCD study participants ages 11 to 14 and their families. These young adolescents and their parents completed pre-pandemic assessments in February 2020, which documented initial parent/caregiver reports of externalizing problems (eg, acting aggressively, breaking rules) and sleep disturbances (eg, eg, sleep duration) and youth reports of internalizing problems. (eg, feeling anxious or depressed). Parents and participating youth then completed three separate online surveys about COVID-19, conducted between May and August 2020, that included more than 200 items in lifestyle and psychosocial domains.

The researchers used machine learning methods to look for patterns of positive affect, anxiety, stress, and depressive symptoms in the surveys. They then interpreted the results through an algorithm to provide an overall ranking of variables based on their importance in predicting youth mental health outcomes. The main variables were classified into eight domains: demographics; coping behaviors (eg, having a regular meal time); physical activities; relations; resources (eg, not being able to buy food), screen time, sleep (eg, pre-pandemic sleep disorders), and other (eg, pre-pandemic psychological problems). Of all the possible predictors considered, positively related variables, such as talking about plans for the next day with parents, participating in family activities, and those related to healthy behaviors such as physical activity and better sleep, were among the main predictors of high positive affect and they also protected against stress, anxiety and depression.

In contrast, more screen time activities, including social media and video games, as well as witnessing racism or discrimination in relation to the coronavirus, emerged as important predictors of negative affect. The study also found that girls, and those who entered the pandemic with existing mental health or sleep problems, appeared to be particularly vulnerable to the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. “Focusing on what you can do to support young people, like maintaining as much of a routine as possible, walking at least 10 minutes a day, and strengthening family relationships, is really important in times of stress.” said Fiona C. Baker, Ph.D., director of the Health Sciences Center at SRI International, Menlo Park, Calif., and principal investigator for the ABCD study site at SRI.

The authors also note that, compared to the full ABCD study sample of approximately 11,800 people at baseline, this study included only a subsample of 3,000 youth with sufficient data from pre-pandemic ABCD assessments and COVID surveys. -19. Compared to the full ABCD study, this subsample of youth was less likely to be Hispanic/Latino (16% vs. 20%), less likely to be Black (7% vs. 15%), and more likely to be Asian (5% vs. percent vs. 4 percent), and their parents were more likely to have higher education (for example, having a graduate degree 42 percent vs. 34 percent). Therefore, the generalizability of this study is limited by the fact that the sample is not representative of the US population.

“This additional collection of COVID data is also a valuable example of how the ABCD study team was able to effectively pivot within such a massive project to take advantage of this important learning opportunity during the pandemic,” said Orsolya Kiss, Ph. D, postdoctoral student. Fellow at SRI International and lead author of the study. “Furthermore, machine learning techniques allowed the data itself to drive the findings, rather than expectations or hypotheses. While the team informed the structure of what data was ingested before and during the pandemic, the model determined what was important.” “.