Linking parenting and informal mentor processes to depressive symptoms among rural African American young adult men.

Abstract

Little is known about the rates of depressive symptoms among rural African American men during young adulthood or the processes that predict those rates. Many rural African American men in the deep South confront difficult environments that provide minimal resources and diminishing social support to help them embark on beneficial life paths. A model of protective processes hypothesized to deter depression among this population was tested that included autonomy-promoting parenting, informal mentoring, and protective self-regulatory processes. Data from a Respondent-Driven Sampling study with 116 rural African American men age 18-21 were used to test study hypotheses. The unadjusted prevalence of clinically significant depression was 37.9%. As predicted, self-regulatory processes mediated the influence of autonomy-promoting parenting on depressive symptoms. Leaving the family home was associated negatively and educational attainment was associated positively with self-regulatory processes. Support from an informal mentor moderated the link between autonomy-promoting parenting and self-regulatory processes. Findings suggest malleable targets for intervention development with this population.