YATW blog 2: Teen Depression

Since the first blog post I’ve written, I’ve done research on new information for my topic, “Teenage Depression.” In my school, I have conducted questions based on the subject and formed a survey to deliver out to the student body. The basic questions were for example, asking their age, their grade, and if they have ever felt sad, and what might be the cause of their sadness. So far, an abundant amount people answered my survey. 

           From the pie chart at the bottom, you can tell that the majority of the participants are females. This shows that the males weren’t as eager to answer as the females in this survey. 

  

    This conspicuous question, “Are you Sad/Depressed?” was asked, and the outcome is very close. 57% of the students answered no, while the other 43% said yes. 

  The students who also answered this survey were between the ages of 12-18.
The people at SLA who answered this survey, was also required to answer, “What do you think causes your sadness?” 

*The highlighted words were all answers that occured more than once.* 

• Insecurities
• Low self-worth 
• Seeing people better than me, or better off. 
• School 
• Stress with my relationship with my boyfriend/girlfriend 
• Changing how I look at myself; disappointment
• Family
• Benchmarks
• Rumors 
• Bullying 
• My Past 
• Loneliness 
• I occasionally feel extremely dysmoprhic. Or as though I don't matter to others.
• Love, how I feel that nobody loves me. 
• Self-esteem 
• Self image 
• Life and Death 
• Hormones 
• My Weight 
• Not having any friends
• Girls 
• Language problems 
• Thyroid condition 
• Negative enviornment 
• Drugs 
• Problems of the world 
  
  

One of the most popular answers for causes their sadness is family issues. For instance, there could be many problems at home; Divorce, death of a loved one, abuse, arguments, etc. This can have a lot of impact on a teen. Another main problem found in my suvery was stress regarding school. Most people went to school and delt with school work, homework, projects etc. 

My research has gotten me a better understanding on my perspective on teen depression. I found out that most people at my high school struggle from depression like me. My personal opinion about my results is that all of those people who answered to being sad are around my age let alone go to my school. I would love to help and talk to them; to let them know that I'm on their side dealing with the same problems. The thing that I am still wondering about is that what can I do for those teens at my school who are struggling with depression? Well, I can start by listening to them at my support group lunch at school and giving them comfort with their situation. 
My agent of change has been to develop a support group lunch, which was said in the first blog post. I've done a lot of research on how to run a big project like this. For instance, this website has many ideas I am basing my group on. What you see on television about support groups being portrayed as just a bunch of people sitting in a circle talking one at a time nervously is the total opposite of what my support group lunch is going to be like. It's going to be a very safe environment supervised by my school counselor and english teacher. 
Here is my Bibliography