Hope, psychosocial well-being and socioeconomic status among adolescents

M.A.The changing political, social, and economic landscape of South Africa witnessed in the interregnum period between 1990 and 1994 has had widespread consequences for the country’s people. Adolescents have experienced their childhood development alongside the development of South Africa’s democracy since 1994. This setting has determined the socioeconomic disparities experienced by these adolescents. Lower socioeconomic status is associated with the prevalence of mental illness and delayed physical development and increased pathology. The present research has endeavoured to explore aspects of mental health in South African adolescents. More particularly, hope, psychosocial well-being, and socioeconomic status of adolescents were investigated. The aim of this study was to explore the prevalence and dynamics of hope and psychosocial well-being among South African adolescents (N = 1069). Participants completed the Children’s Hope Scale (CHS), the Mental Health Continuum – Short form for youths (MHC-SF), and a biographical questionnaire including a subjective rating of socioeconomic status. Specific hypotheses were formulated concerning: the prevalence of hope in adolescents, the prevalence of psychosocial well-being, the relationship between hope and psychosocial well-being, and socioeconomic status as a moderator in the relationship between hope and psychosocial well-being. The prevalence of hope and of psychosocial well-being across racial groups was investigated by means of a one-way between groups analysis of variance (ANOVA). The results indicated that adolescents experience relatively high levels of hope across racial groups with no significant effect for race on hope scores for the four groups, F (4, 1168) = 1.431, p > .05. Relatively high levels of psychosocial well-being are experienced by adolescents with no significant effect of race on emotional well-being, F (4, 1112) = .716, p > .05, and no significant effect of race on social well-being, F (4, 1136) = 2.354, p > .05. However, the effect of race was significant for total psychosocial well-being, F (4, 1088) = 3.611, p < .05. Post hoc comparisons with the Tukey HSD test indicated that significant differences existed specifically between the black (M = 43.84, SD = 11.24) and white groups (M = 41.35, SD = 11.93), with the black group yielding higher mean scores of psychosocial well-being. Moreover, there was a significant effect for race on psychological well-being, F (4, 1140) = 5.103, p < .05. Post hoc comparisons with the Tukey HSD test indicated that significant differences existed particularly between the black (M = 21.76, SD = 5.31) and white groups (M = 20.57, SD = 5.72), and coloured (M = 22.38, SD = 5.83) and white groups (M = 20.57, SD = 5.72). Both the black and coloured groups yielded higher mean scores of psychosocial well-being in comparison to the white group