Depression Among Racially, Ethnically, and Culturally Diverse Adolescents

Symptoms of depression represent a signifi cant health problem for adolescents (Peterson et al., 1993). Increasingly, evidence points to greater risk for depression among adolescents from racial and ethnic minority groups (Angold and Costello, 2001). Given that this evidence comes from studies that focus on different populations, of different ages, and use different measures, it is a major challenge to draw any fi rm conclusions about how great this differential risk actually is, or how this risk might vary for different sociodemographic groups (Roberts, Roberts, and Chen, 1997). The need to meet this challenge is urgent, given that high rates of depressive symptoms in adolescence create a considerable risk for depression in later life (Reinherz et al., 2006). The population of minority youth, currently at 46% of the young people (U.S. Census Bureau, 2000), is expected to increase even further over the next several years. Current immigration trends will further contribute to their number, and their racial, ethnic and cultural diversity (Holmes, 2001). Their increasing numbers, combined with the debilitating impact of depressive symptoms, and the wide disparities in access to competent diagnosis and treatment (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services [HHS], 2001) all suggest that it is indeed time for a review of the current state of knowledge.