Adolescent Friendship Formation and Mental Health: A Stochastic Actor-Based Model of Help-Seeking Behavior

Figures & Tables

Individual Characteristic at Wave I		n per category	Psychological counseling use within category in past year at Wave I (% of n)
All Subjects		2,264	8.7
Gender	Male	1,159	6.9
Gender	Female	1,105	10.6	χ²=9.63^**
Age	12-13 years	153	5.9
	14-15 years	647	10.2
	16-17 years	1,339	8.4
	18-19 years	125	7.3	χ²=3.80
Race	Non-Hispanic white	1,144	11.3
	Black	368	7.4
	White Hispanic	418	5.7
	Other	334	5.4	χ²=20.81^***
Modified CES-D depression score	0-23	2,096	7.7
Modified CES-D depression score	24 or more	168	21	χ²=34.06^***
Self-rated physical health	Excellent	580	7.8
	Very good	897	7.4
	Good	604	10.8
	Fair/Poor	183	11.5	χ²=7.76
Frequency of alcohol consumption, past 12 months	None	1,138	5.3
	1-2 times	410	11.2
	3-12 times	316	11.1
	More than monthly, less than weekly	185	14.1
	Weekly or more often	215	14	χ²=36.64^***
Bike/skate/car/boat racing frequency	Never	1,028	8.4
	Once or twice	536	8.3
	Once a month or less	158	9.1
	Two or three times a month	148	13.3
	Weekly or more often	394	8.4	χ²=3.32
Mother’s education	Less than high school	464	8.8
	High school graduate	1,019	8.4
	Some college	287	9.8
	Graduated college	494	8.5	χ²=0.55
Friendship nominations received	0-1	491	8.3
	2-3	668	9
	5-6	601	8.5
	7+	504	8.4	χ²=0.20
Friendship nominations sent	0-1	496	7.4
	2-4	669	8
	5-6	482	12.1
	7+	617	7.4	χ²=8.08*
3-step friendship reach	0-14	583	7.4
	15-42	559	6.9
	43-76	559	9.1
	77+	563	11	χ²=6.15
Local friendship density	0-0.20	563	10.1
	0.21-0.29	546	9.9
	0.30-0.39	590	7.3
	0.40-1.00	565	7.3	χ²=4.15

Characteristic
Demographics
Male (%)	51.2
Age, mean (sd) (years)	15.8 (1.3)
Age, range (years)	12-18
Grade Level (%)
7th grade	6.7
8th grade	6.8
9th grade	16.2
10th grade	35.8
11th grade	34.5
Race (%)
Non-Hispanic white	50.5
Black	16.3
White Hispanic	18.5
Other	14.8
Individual Characteristics
Depression (modified CES-D score), mean (sd)	11.9 (7.5)
Self-rated physical health (%)
Excellent	25.7
Very good	39.6
Good	26.7
Fair	7.7
Poor	0.5
Frequency of alcohol consumption, past 12 months (%)
None	49.6
1-2 times	18.3
3-12 times	14.2
More than monthly, less than weekly	8.3
Weekly or more often	9.6
Add Health Picture Vocabulary Test, mean (sd)	99.1 (13.2)
Bike/skate/car/boat racing frequency (%)
Never	45.4
Once or twice	23.7
Once a month or less	7
Two or three times a month	6.5
Weekly or more often	17.4
Mother’s education (%)
Less than high school	20.5
High school graduate	45
Some college	12.6
Graduated college	21.8

Variable	Est. b	SE	t-ratio
Friendship evolution
Psychological counseling effect on nominations sent	0.50^**	0.14	3.57
Psychological counseling effect on nominations received	−0.08	0.13	−0.62
Psychological counseling similarity	0.32	0.15	2.13
Outdegree	−3.14^***	0.34	−9.24
Reciprocity	2.44^***	0.2	12.19
Transitive triplets	0.84^***	0.09	9.33
3-cycles	−0.46*	0.15	−3.07
Age similarity	1.19*	0.42	2.83
Same gender	0.34^***	0.04	8.52
Same race/ethnicity	0.39^**	0.13	2.98
AHPVT similarity	0.65^***	0.1	6.46
Alcohol use similarity	0.66^***	0.08	8.24
Depression effect on nominations sent	−0.21*	0.09	−2.31
Depression effect on nominations received	−0.08*	0.04	−2.21
Depression similarity	0.14	0.13	1.07
Psychological counseling evolution
Tendency (linear)	−3.35^***	0.42	−7.96
Friendship nominations received	0.13	0.07	1.83
Friendship nominations sent	0.03	0.12	0.21
Psychological counseling use by friends	0.02	0.1	0.18
Local density	−0.11	0.36	−0.31
3-step reach	0	0.08	−0.04
Age	−0.1	0.19	−0.53
Gender (male)	−0.88*	0.24	−3.61
Race (white)	0.03	0.07	0.41
Depression	1.34*	0.45	2.94
Alcohol use	0.37*	0.13	2.85
Sensation seeking	0.18	0.09	2.02
Self-rated physical health	0.02	0.12	0.15
Mother’s education	0.05	0.18	0.29