"What Are Some of the Things You Are Worried About?": An Analysis of Youth's Open-Ended Responses of Current Worries.

Abstract

Introduction: There is widespread concern that contemporary global issues (e.g., climate change, technology use) are exacerbating a "youth wellbeing crisis." However, we have heard little about this issue from youth themselves. To ascertain whether youth themselves are worried about global issues, their mental health, or other aspects of their life, we asked youth an open-ended question about their current worries. Further, we assessed whether mental health was related to self-generated worries.

Methods: Participants, 516 youth 13-19 years old (M_age = 15.60, SD = 1.65, 48.2% female) from Canada, responded to the question: "What are some of the things you are worried about?" Youth also self-reported on demographics, social anxiety, depressive symptoms, and general worry.

Results: Youth generated a range of worries, with the most common worries being school and their future. Few adolescents directly mentioned the state of the world, covid, or their own mental health. Worries were differentially associated with mental health problems and youth who reported worrying about "everything" or reported many worries had worse mental health compared to peers.

Conclusions: Contemporary issues, that often are cited as a concern, were not a focal point of youth's responses. Asking open-ended questions to youth about their worries may be a way to identify which youth may be experiencing poor mental health.