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Appendix
Demographic Differences in Depressive Symptoms
This survey is not intended as a comprehensive analysis of the extent
and severity of depressive symptoms among teens and young adults.
The primary purpose of including measures of depressive symptoms in
the survey is to explore how those young people coping with depres-
sion use digital health resources and social media, and whether their
patterns of use are different than among those without depression.
However, in considering the results, it is important to keep in mind that
certain demographic groups in this sample are more likely to experi-
ence depression than others.
One way of exploring differences among demographic groups is by
looking at the percent of respondents who fall into each level of severity.
Using this method, we can see in the table below that there are some
differences by gender, with 24% of females exhibiting moderate
depressive symptoms, compared to 9% of males. But the most pro-
nounced differences – and they are dramatic – are by sexual orienta-
tion. More than half (59%) the teen and young adult LGBTQ respondents
in our survey exhibit moderate to moderately severe symptoms of
depression, compared to 20% of the heterosexual survey population.
And more than one in four (29%) LGBTQ respondents are classified
at the moderately severe to severe level, compared to just 5% of the
straight population in this survey. (There were no statistically significant
differences by race/ethnicity).
