Adolescent depression affects around 8.3% of youth and is characterized by persistent sadness, loss of interest, and disrupted sleep and appetite. It can be difficult to diagnose due to normal mood changes during puberty. Causes include genetic predisposition, stressful life events, and low parental warmth. Effects involve mood, behavior, and academic problems. Treatments include cognitive behavioral therapy and interpersonal therapy to challenge negative thoughts and address relationships. Further development of adolescent-specific therapies is still needed.

1. B Y :
J A C O B R E D L I N G S H A F E R
Adolescent Depression

2. Table of Contents
 What is Adolescent Depression?
 Causes of Adolescent Depression
 Effects of Adolescent Depression
 Treatment of Adolescent Depression

4. What is Adolescent Depression? Cont.
 Depression – A serious mood disorder that affects
8.3% of adolescents, with about one third of
adolescents experiencing depressive moods (Burgic-
Radmanovic, 2011).
 Classidied by symptoms of persistent and pervasive
sadness, loss of interest or pleasure in activities, low
self esteem, excessive guilt, suicidal thoughts or
behavior, and sleep and appetite disruptions
(Maughan, Collishaw, &Stringaris, 2013).

5. What is Adolescent Depression? Cont.
 This can be very challenging to classify in
adolescents because they are experiencing a great
deal of emotional changes from hormones and
puberty.
 The factor that sets depression apart from normal
mood changes is symptoms that last for an extended
amount of time that disrupt daily living for an
adolescent.

6. Causes of Adolescent Depression:
 Genetic:
 An adolescent‟s genes, that have a predisposition for
depression can greatly increase the chance that they have a
depressive episode in adolescence.
 A adolescent can be brought into the world much more likely
to become depressed depending on what the mother‟s
situation was leading up to the pregnancy.
 “The fetal programming hypothesis states that under stressful
conditions pregnant mothers send messages to the fetus to prepare
it for a hostile environment (Colman, Ataullahjan, Naicker, & Van
Lieshout, 2012).”

7.  Other Factors:
 Even an adolescent does not have predisposed to depression
they can still develop it.
 Adolescents that are exposed to high stress environments run
the risk of developing depression.
 Increasing Likelihood:
 Low levels of parental warmth.
 Parental mental health problems.
 Early or chronic adversity such as abuse, poverty or social
disadvantage.
 (Vogel, 2012)
Causes of Adolescent Depression: Cont.

8. Effects of Adolescent Depression:
 Symptoms of Depression:
 Mood is sad or unhappy, with very little spontaneity.
 Irritability with nagging, whining and angry outbursts (may be mistaken for „naughtiness‟).
 Loss of interest in usual activities with energy level changes, which may be increased
or decreased.
 Changes in appetite accompanied by weight changes, or „fussy‟ eating.
 Changes in sleep pattern.
 Capacity to have fun is reduced, the child complains of boredom.
 Self-esteem may be low.
 There may be social withdrawal such as refusing to visit friends.
 They may talk less and may express the wish to be dead, with suicidal attempts or
ideation.
 They may express guilt and feelings of hopelessness.
 Poor concentration associated with depression may be mistaken for attention deficit
hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
 They may present with physical complaints such as a headache or sore tummy and somatise.
 High levels of anxiety may predate the onset of depression.
• (VOGEL, 2012)

9. Treatments of Adolescent Depression:
 Treatments for youth depression were first
developed for the treatments of adults and therefore
are not tailored toward the adolescent.
 Though a proper development of treatment for
adolescent depression is still in the works there are
two forms of psychotherapy used, cognitive-
behavioral therapy (CBT) and interpersonal therapy
(IPT) (Vogel, 2012).

10. Treatments of Adolescent Depression: Cont.
 “CBT is the most frequently used of the two, this
starts with psycho-education and includes self
monitoring, e.g. diary keeping, challenging cognitive
distortions, and activity scheduling, IPT addresses
more of the problem relationship portion of
psychotherapy, such as transition or losses, and as
role conflict (Vogel, 2012).”

11. Conclusion
 Adolescent depression is an absolute problem in
today‟s society, because of the disregard for what is
going on.
 The best step an adolescent can take, is being
proactive on their mental health and take
preventative measures.
 Depression is serious and can cause life long
problems and in extreme cases death.

12. Refferences
 Burgic-Burgic-Radmanovic, M. (2011, April 3). Affective disorders
in childhood and adolescence. ActaMedicaAcademica, 40(1), 67-74.
Retrieved April 21, 2013, from Ebscohost.
 Colman, I., Ataullahjan, A., Naicker, K., & Van Lieshout, R. J. (2012,
January). Birth weight, stress, and symptoms of depression in
adolescence: Evidence of fetal programming in a National Canadian
Cohort. CanJPsychiatry, 57(7), 422-428. Retrieved April 21, 2013,
from Ebscohost.
 Maughan, B., Collishaw, S., &Stringaris, A. (2013, February).
Depression in childhood and adolescene. Journal of the Canadian
Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 22(1), 35-40. Retrieved
April 21, 2013, from Ebscohost.
 Vogel, W. (2012, April). Depression in children and adolescents.
CME: South Africa's Continuing Medical Education Journal, 30(4),
114-117. Retrieved April 21, 2013, from Ebscohost.