Acculturation Impacts on Depressive Symptoms Among Hispanic Sexual Minority Youth and Hispanic Non-sexual Minority Youth.

Abstract

Little is known about the role of acculturation in preventing depressive symptoms among sexual minority youth. This study examined the impact of bidimensional acculturation (i.e. Americanism-adherence to mainstream cultural values and Hispanicism-adherence to heritage cultural values) on the trajectory of adolescent depressive symptoms and differences among Hispanic sexual minority youth (HSMY) and Hispanic non-SMY. We examined the trajectories of adolescent depressive symptoms and parent and adolescent acculturation across 36-months and regressed the slope of the trajectory of depressive symptoms on the slope of the trajectory of parent and adolescent Hispanicism and Americanism among the overall sample (N = 456), HSMY (n = 85; 20%), and Hispanic non-SMY (n = 339; 80.0%). For the overall sample and Hispanic non-SMY, adolescents' own Hispanicism and Americanism and parent Americanism buffered adolescent depressive symptoms. There were no significant associations between adolescent or parent Hispanicism or Americanism and HSMY depressive symptoms, however, the effect sizes for HSMY were larger than those of the overall sample and Hispanic non-SMY, suggesting that the study was underpowered to detect statistical significance with the limited sample size. Americanism and Hispanicism may mitigate depressive symptoms among Hispanic youth, speaking to the importance of biculturalism in Hispanic families.