how do adolescents define depression? - cIRcle - University of ...

Chapter V: Discussion
development, and adjustments in cultural beliefs and social institutions. This study's finding
indicates that emotion awareness is a significant contributor to depressive symptomatology.
Hence, how can emotion awareness, also a critical component to social competence, be
experienced and refined within social relationships?
Future research should continue to examine adolescents' recognition of their
vulnerabilities, and emotion-focused interventions. Differentiations of adolescents' self-
recognition of depression may be valuable in early detection of depression. Poor Emotion
Awareness, emotion Expressive Reluctance, decreasing dimensions of coping with sadness, and
gender contributed to increasing levels of depressive symptomatology. Pilot investigations in
different forms of practice strategies can explore emotion-focused interventions for boys and
girls. These strategies would need to include intersectoral teams who develop, build on, and
interconnect the research findings that can translate into relevant practical interventions that
communicate with adolescents.
Theory of Mind (ToM) researchers are interested in understanding children's own
understanding of their mental lives or mental states (Chandler & Carpendale, 1998; Taylor,
1996). Theory of Mind may interconnect with formal operational thinking and interconnect with
personal experiences, understanding, conceptions of depression, and self-recognition of
depression; however, research has not explored this area. Future research can initiate
investigations with these links.
Adolescents' conceptions of depression included Stigma, and exploration of this area
would be valuable in addition to research examining the stigmatizing labels we attach to
depression. In attaching labels such as "negative mood" or 'negative cognitions," are we
distinguishing what depression really means to adolescents to help them with their depressive
symptomatology? What information do we impart when distinguishing a "negative" label and
attaching it to a characteristic of depression? How do we want to differentiate depression and
what value do we want to attach to these labels? These questions relate to Stigma.
Studies that integrate cultural differences in conceptions of depression and pathways to
talking to someone when depressed would be a valuable addition to research strategies that can
inform each other. Ethnicity was diverse in this study sample. Further differentiating cultural
differences in adolescents' conceptions of depression and their pathways to talking when
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