Exploring the role of social networks in youth mental health

Social network analysis (SNA) offers an innovative approach to understand youths' complex social support systems. Growing work highlights links between youths' social networks and mental health. We used SNA to examine associations between social network characteristics and psychological empowerment, depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress among youth living in areas with concentrated disadvantage. We administered egocentric social network surveys in which youth (i.e., egos) enumerated individuals in their social network (i.e., alters), answered questions about each alter, and described how alters were connected. We measured psychological empowerment and mental health symptoms with validated instruments. There were 111 youth in the analytic sample (mean age: 14.6 years [SD: 1.5]; female: n = 63 [57%]; Black: n = 79 [71%]; multiracial/other: n = 23 [21%]). Among 477 alters, most were parents/guardians, siblings, or extended family. Higher betweenness centrality (i.e., a measure of connectivity) was associated with greater anxiety and post-traumatic stress after adjusting for other variables. Findings illustrate that network connectivity may exert varying influences on mental health symptoms. Ongoing work is needed to describe the dynamic nature of youth support systems and how these relationships can be leveraged to promote well-being.