Mental Health Improves After Transition From Comprehensive School to Vocational Education or Employment in England: A National Cohort Study

Underpinned by stage-environment fit and job demands-resources theories, this study examined how adolescents' anxiety, depressive symptoms, and positive functioning developed as they transferred from comprehensive school to further education, employment or training, or became NEET (not in educa...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Developmental psychology 2016-04, Vol.52 (4), p.652-665
Main Authors: Symonds, Jennifer, Dietrich, Julia, Chow, Angela, Salmela-Aro, Katariina
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Achievement
Adolescent
Adolescents
Analysis of Variance
Anxieties
Anxiety
Anxiety-Depression
Apprenticeships
Change
Childhood
Cohort Analysis
Cohort Studies
Continuing education
Depression (Psychology)
Education Work Relationship
Employment
England
Ethnicity
Female
Foreign Countries
Geistige Entwicklung
Human
Humans
Job characteristics
Life Changes
Longitudinal Studies
Major Depression
Male
Mental depression
Mental Health
National Surveys
Personality Theories
Postsecondary Education
Psychische Gesundheit
Pädagogische Psychologie
Questionnaires
School to Work Transition
School Transition
Schools
Schule
Schulübergang
Secondary Schools
Sex Factors
Socioeconomic status
Structural Equation Models
Surveys and Questionnaires
Teenagers
Vocational Education
Vocational Education - methods
Work environment
Young Adult
Zukunftsangst
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Summary:Underpinned by stage-environment fit and job demands-resources theories, this study examined how adolescents' anxiety, depressive symptoms, and positive functioning developed as they transferred from comprehensive school to further education, employment or training, or became NEET (not in education, employment, or training), at age 16 years, in the longitudinal English national cohort study Next Steps (N = 13,342). Controlling for childhood achievement, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, and gender, we found that NEET adolescents had the largest losses in mental health. This pattern was similar to adolescents staying on at school who had increased anxiety and depression, and decreased positive functioning, after transition. In comparison, adolescents transferring to full-time work, apprenticeships, or vocational college experienced gains in mental health.
ISSN:0012-1649
1939-0599
1939-0599
DOI:10.1037/a0040118