Cross-National Trends in Adolescents Psychological and Somatic Complaints Before and After the Onset of COVID-19 Pandemic

Alina Cosma; Gina Martin; Margreet E de Looze; Sophie D Walsh; Leena Paakkari; Ludwig Bilz; Inese Gobina; Nicholas Page; Sabina Hulbert; Jo Inchley; Ulrike Ravens-Sieberer; Tania Gaspar; Gonneke W J M Stevens

doi:10.1016/j.jadohealth.2024.09.028

Cross-National Trends in Adolescents Psychological and Somatic Complaints Before and After the Onset of COVID-19 Pandemic

J Adolesc Health. 2024 Nov 12:S1054-139X(24)00462-2. doi: 10.1016/j.jadohealth.2024.09.028. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Sociology, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland; School of Psychology, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland. Electronic address: alina.cosma@hbsc.org.
² Faculty of Health Disciplines, Athabasca University, Athabasca, Alberta, Canada; Department of Geography and Environment, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada.
³ Department of Interdisciplinary Social Science, Utrecht University, Utrecht, the Netherlands.
⁴ Faculty of Social Sciences, Department of Criminology, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.
⁵ Faculty of Sport and Health Sciences, University of Jyväskylä, Jyväskylä, Finland.
⁶ Faculty of Human Sciences, Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg, Cottbus, Germany.
⁷ Department of Public Health and Epidemiology, Riga Stradins University, Riga, Latvia; Department of Education and Research, Children's Clinical University Hospital, Riga, Latvia.
⁸ Centre for Development, Evaluation, Complexity and Implementation in Public Health Improvement (DECIPHer), Cardiff University, Cardiff, United Kingdom.
⁹ Centre for Health Services Studies, University of Kent, Kent, United Kingdom.
¹⁰ School of Health and Wellbeing, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, United Kingdom.
¹¹ Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany.
¹² Lusíada Center for Research in Social Work and Social Intervention (CLISSIS), Lusíada University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal.

PMID: 39530972
DOI: 10.1016/j.jadohealth.2024.09.028

Abstract

Purpose: Building on research suggesting that the COVID-19 pandemic may have led to an exacerbation of deteriorating trends in mental health among adolescents, this paper examined trends in adolescents' psychological and somatic complaints across 35 countries from 2010 to 2022, and tested trends in sociodemographic inequalities in these outcomes between 2018 and 2022.

Methods: Using data from 792,606 adolescents from 35 countries (51% girls; mean age = 13.5; standard deviation 1.6) across four Health Behaviour in School-aged Children surveys (2010, 2014, 2018, 2022), hierarchical multilevel models estimated cross-national trends in adolescent psychological and somatic complaints. We tested whether observed values in 2022 were in line with predicted values based on 2010-2018 linear trends. Finally, moderation effects of age, family affluence, and family structures on the outcomes were tested (2018-2022).

Results: Both girls and boys showed substantially higher levels of psychological complaints in 2022 compared with the predicted values. For somatic complaints, higher levels than predicted in 2022 were observed only in girls. Moderation analyses revealed an increase from 2018 to 2022 in age gaps and a narrowing in the socioeconomic gap for both outcomes. Also, there was a widening gap between adolescents living with 2 parents and those living in a single parent household in 2022 compared to 2018.

Discussion: Cross-national increases in adolescent psychological and somatic complaints were higher than expected in 2022, based on previous trends. Magnitudes of change varied across different sociodemographics groups, with implications for pre-existing mental health inequalities.

Keywords: HBSC; cross-cultural; gender; mental health; socio-economic inequalities; time trends.