Typologies of joint family activities and associations with mental health and wellbeing among adolescents from four countries

Purpose

This study aims to identify distinct typologies of joint family activities and the associations with mental health and wellbeing among adolescents across four countries from the WHO European region.

Methods

The 2017/18 data from adolescents from Armenia (n=3,977, Mage=13.5±1.6 years, 53.4% female), Czechia (n=10,656, Mage=13.4±1.7, 50.1% female), Russia (n=4,096 Mage=13.8±1.7, 52.4% female) and Slovakia (n=3,282, Mage=13.4±1.5, 51.0% female) were collected in schools. The respondents self-reported their participation in joint family leisure-time activities, life satisfaction, psychological and somatic complaints, as well as a range of demographic and family situational factors. Stratified by countries, latent class analysis identified typologies of joint family activities, and logistic regression models explored cross-sectional associations with life satisfaction, and psychological and somatic complaints.

Results

Three typologies were identified across each of the four countries, distinguished by low, moderate, and high levels of family engagement. Adolescents with higher family engagement generally reported greater life satisfaction and fewer psychological complaints as compared to those with lower family engagement. Russian adolescents in the high family engagement typology reported fewer somatic complaints compared to those with low family engagement. In addition, adolescents from Czechia and Russia showing moderate family engagement also reported fewer psychological complaints compared to those in the low family engagement typology.

Conclusions

Our findings from four countries suggest that adolescents with high family engagement have greater life satisfaction and fewer psychological complaints, pointing towards a need for interventions to support family engagement among adolescents. Further research is needed to fully explore underlying mechanisms.