During the COVID-19 pandemic, undergraduates found themselves in an unprecedented social situation. Campuses across North America closed, as universities moved to remote learning. When in-person ...classes resumed, students had to negotiate the return to on-campus life. The current investigation examines predictive associations between pandemic-related stressors and distress during this transition, focusing on social media activity as a potential moderator. A longitudinal sample of 349 students at an urban university (116 men, 222 women, 11 nonbinary; Mage = 20.37) completed consecutive waves of measures (fall 2021 to spring 2022). A cross-sectional replication was recruited in spring 2022 (163 men, 229 women, 34 nonbinary). In both samples, we assessed social media activity using a newly developed measure. We also assessed internalizing symptoms, loneliness, and exposure to pandemic stressors. COVID-19 stress predicted increases in internalizing symptoms, but the effect held only for students who acknowledged high levels of active online communication.
•COVID stress was associated with internalizing symptoms for undergraduates returning to campus after remote instruction.•Active and passive subtypes of social media use were demonstrated in two independent samples.•Online-only communication and active communication moderated associations between COVID stress and internalizing symptoms.•Links between COVID stress and internalizing held only at high levels of online-only communication or active communication.
Some researchers and clinicians may feel hesitant to assess sexual orientation and gender-related characteristics in youth surveys because they are unsure if youth will respond to these questions or ...are concerned the questions will cause discomfort or offense. This can result in missed opportunities to identify LGBTQ+ youth and address health inequities among this population. The aim of this study was to examine the prevalence and sociodemographic patterns of missingness among survey questions assessing current sexual orientation, gender identity and expression (SOGIE), and past change in sexual orientation (sexual fluidity) among a diverse sample of U.S. youth. Participants (
= 4,245, ages 14-25 years; 95% cisgender, 70% straight/heterosexual, 53% youth of color), recruited from an online survey panel, completed the Wave 1 survey of the longitudinal Sexual Orientation Fluidity in Youth (SO*FLY) Study in 2021. Current SOGIE, past sexual fluidity, and sociodemographic characteristics were assessed for missingness. Overall, 95.7% of participants had no missing questions, 3.8% were missing one question, and 0.5% were missing ≥ 2 questions. Past sexual fluidity and assigned sex were most commonly missing. Sociodemographic differences between participants who skipped the SOGIE questions and the rest of the sample were minimal. Missingness for the examined items was low and similar across sociodemographic characteristics, suggesting that almost all youth are willing to respond to survey questions about SOGIE. SOGIE and sexual fluidity items should be included in surveys and clinical assessments of youth to inform clinical care, policy-making, interventions, and resource development to improve the health of all youth. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).
Suicide is a leading cause of death among Black emerging adults. The concurrent effect of the COVID-19 pandemic and racial discrimination were projected to exacerbate suicide vulnerability for Black ...Americans. The purpose of the present study was to utilize a risk-resilience model to examine the effects of racial discrimination and COVID-related stress on suicide risk for Black emerging adults, as well as the moderating effect of three central components of radical healing: critical consciousness, resilience, and cultural authenticity. Study participants included 521 Black emerging adults between the ages of 18 and 29 (51.6% male; M age = 24.6, SD = 2.6) who completed measures evaluating symptoms of racial discrimination, COVID-related stress, suicide risk, and psychological well-being. After controlling for age, gender, socioeconomic status, and general stress, structural equation modeling analyses revealed unique and interactive effects of racial discrimination, COVID-related stress, and culturally relevant protective factors on suicide risk for Black emerging adults. These findings provide preliminary insight into novel risk and protective factors that influence suicide risk for Black emerging adults. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved) (Source: journal abstract)
The current study investigates stability and change in self-esteem among Russian emerging adults. Self-esteem of 1004 undergraduates (Mage = 19.50, SDage = 1.25) was assessed during their bachelor's ...program (T1). Eight years later, 242 of them took part in an online follow-up (T2). Self-esteem was measured with the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale. We conducted a longitudinal confirmatory factor analysis with strict measurement invariance constraints. Self-esteem showed substantial mean-level stability and rank-order consistency, both for women and men. No sex differences, effects of parenthood and change in the place of residence were found. Those participants who had had higher self-esteem at T1 were more likely married by T2 compared to singles, and those who cohabited with their partner by T2. Although individual differences in the self-esteem change cannot be excluded, the findings support the idea of self-esteem stability during emerging adulthood, both in the mean-level and rank-order terms.
Judged by the sheer amount of global media coverage, loneliness rates seem to be an increasingly urgent societal concern. From the late 1970s onward, the life experiences of emerging adults have been ...changing massively due to societal developments such as increased fragmentation of social relationships, greater mobility opportunities, and changes in communication due to technological innovations. These societal developments might have coincided with an increase in loneliness in emerging adults. In the present preregistered cross-temporal meta-analysis, we examined whether loneliness levels in emerging adults have changed over the last 43 years. Our analysis is based on 449 means from 345 studies with 437 independent samples and a total of 124,855 emerging adults who completed the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Loneliness Scale between 1976 and 2019. Averaged across all studies, loneliness levels linearly increased with increasing calendar years (β = .224, 95% CI .138, .309). This increase corresponds to 0.56 standard deviations on the UCLA Loneliness Scale over the 43-year studied period. Overall, the results imply that loneliness can be a rising concern in emerging adulthood. Although the frequently used term "loneliness epidemic" seems exaggerated, emerging adults should therefore not be overlooked when designing interventions against loneliness.
Public Significance StatementThe present cross-temporal meta-analysis suggests that loneliness in emerging adults slightly increased over historical time from 1976 until 2019. Consequently, emerging adults should not be overlooked when designing future interventions or public health campaigns against loneliness.
Abstract
Objective
Our study explores how emerging adults navigate the tension between autonomy and connection in communication with their parents.
Background
For many emerging adults, the first few ...years outside of the home have come to be defined more by connection than autonomy. Information communication technologies (ICTs) are frequently cited as encouraging this constant contact between parents and emerging adults. Yet emerging adults also use technologies to develop a sense of who they are outside of their family of origin.
Method
We used in‐depth interviews with 21 college students to better understand how emerging adults use ICTs to keep in touch with their parents, how they make sense of mediated connections, and how they navigate autonomy and connection in their justification of ICT options.
Results
Participants reported communicating with their parents frequently, often daily. Although communication behaviors suggested a privileging of connection over autonomy, participants' explanations of ICT choice invoked autonomy by highlighting personal preferences and compatibility with their busy lifestyle as justification for choosing how or when they would communicate with their parents. Participants also tended to attribute their use of nonpreferred ICTs to external factors such as situational factors and parents' limited technology skills.
Conclusion
Participants used ICTs to maintain a connection with their parents during college, but framed the specific ICTs they used to communicate with their parents in terms that emphasized their autonomy as emerging adults. Our study contributes to research on emerging adulthood, family relationships, and technology by providing a new conceptualization of the autonomy and connection dialectic that recognizes how today's technologies have collapsed interpersonal distance.
Psychological distress often onsets during adolescence, necessitating an accurate understanding of its development. Assessing change in distress is based on the seldom examined premise of ...longitudinal measurement invariance (MI). Thus, we used three waves of data from Next Steps, a representative cohort of young people in the UK (
= 13,539) to examine MI of the General Health Questionnaire-12 (GHQ-12). We examined MI across time and gender from ages 15 to 25 in four competing latent models: (a) a single-factor model, (b) a three-factor correlated model, (c) a bifactor model of "general distress" and two orthogonal specific factors capturing positive and negative wording, and (d) a single-factor model including error covariances of negatively phrased items. We also tested acceptability of assumptions underlying sum score models. For all factor models, residual MI was confirmed from ages 15 to 25 years and across gender. The bifactor model had the best fit. While sum score model fit was not unequivocally acceptable, most mean differences across time and gender were equivalent across sum scores and latent difference scores. Thus, GHQ-12 sum scores may be used to assess change in psychological distress in young people. However, latent scores appear more accurate, and model fit can be improved by accounting for item wording.
Best friendships and romantic relationships are linked to psychological well-being in emerging adulthood, but few studies have assessed their contribution simultaneously. This research (n = 190; ...64.4% women) examined the links between intimacy and conflict with the best friend and the romantic partner on psychological well-being (self-esteem, depression, loneliness). Results showed that both relationships were independently linked to well-being, while also interacting with one another. Among participants reporting a less intimate or conflictual romantic relationship, an intimate best friendship was linked to higher self-esteem. Moreover, a conflictual best friendship was related to higher depressive symptoms only among those having a conflictual romantic relationship. Thus, best friendships and romantic relationships show distinct and combined contributions to well-being in emerging adulthood.
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