Young adults' self-sufficiency in daily life: the relationship with contextual factors and health indicators

Certain factors, such as depressive symptoms and binge drinking, may be linked to young adults' ability to attain an acceptable level of functioning on specific life-domains (i.e. self-sufficiency). We studied the association of contextual factors and health indicators with self-sufficiency in young adults.

We used both baseline (n = 755) and 6-months follow-up (n = 200) self-reported questionnaire data of intermediate vocational education students (16-26 years). The questionnaire included the adapted Dutch self-sufficiency matrix (SSM-D), which addresses self-sufficiency regarding 11 life-domains (e.g. finances and housing). The questionnaire also included potentially associated contextual factors (e.g. socio-demographic characteristics) and health indicators (e.g. sickness absence from school). Ordinal (overall self-sufficiency: self-sufficient on 11, 10, 9 or ≤ 8 life-domains), and logistic (self-sufficiency per life-domain: self-sufficient yes/no) regression models were applied.

The studied population was 18.6 years on average (SD 2.04), and 73.6% were female. Cannabis use was associated with a lower overall self-sufficiency category at baseline (OR = 0.57, 95% CI = 0.33-0.99), as were an increase in sick days (OR = 0.94, 95% CI = 0.91-0.98) and an increase on the scale of depressive symptoms (OR = 0.87, 95% CI = 0.85-0.89). An increase in sick days and an increase on the scale of depressive symptoms were associated with lower odds of being self-sufficient on three and ten life-domains, respectively (p < 0.05). An increase on the scale of depressive symptoms was associated with a lower overall self-sufficiency category 6-months post-baseline (OR = 0.90, 95% CI = 0.86-0.93).

Our findings underline the importance of addressing self-sufficiency, sickness absence, and depressive symptoms, preferably before the transition from adolescence to young adulthood has begun.