The Web’s Potential to Provide Depression Literacy Resources to Latinx Teens: A Missed Opportunity?

Abstract

Among U.S. adolescents, Latinxs have the highest levels of depression and the lowest access to treatment. Educational resources on the World Wide Web have potential to redress disparities by improving mental health literacy, but little is known about the availability and quality of web documents about depression targeting Latinx teens. We conducted a qualitative content analysis of search-engine results to inform future research. Of the 330 results, the majority (48%) were news stories, most with breaking news in Spanish about youth suicides. Only two documents targeted Latinx youth, including one that was depression-specific. A critique of this document revealed that although it met some indicators of web-resource quality, it did not meet its potential to empower Latinx teens to raise their depression literacy. We argue that such scarcity is an access barrier to preventive care and contributes to existing disparities. We highlight the need for web documents aiming to enhance depression literacy among Latinx teens that are both easily discoverable as well as socio-politically and culturally tailored.

Keywords:

• Adolescent
• depression
• digital technologies
• Latinx
• mental health literacy
• teen
• World Wide Web

Acknowledgments

We wish to thank Stephanie Willen Brown, Lucero Sifuentes, Pablo Miño, and Josh Barker for assistance with this study.

Notes

1 We define Latinx teens as 13- to 17-year-old adolescents residing in the U.S., but the age ranges vary in the literature.

2 Our preliminary searches also included nonaccented forms for “jóvenes” and “depresión” to see if the accent would make a difference in results (it did not).

Additional information

Funding

Seed grant to first author from Hussman School of Journalism and Media, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill.