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Abstract: The goals of the present analysis include 1) establishing a relationship between age at first sexual intercourse and depression diagnosis in adulthood; and 2) determining whether or not the relationship between age at first sexual intercourse and depression diagnosis differs based on the participant’s gender. That is, this study investigated whether age of first sexual intercourse is associated with a reported depression diagnosis in adulthood, and whether the difference is consistent across gender.
The sample from National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) represents a surveyed group in the United States (including Alaska and Hawaii) at several points in their lives, this paper will focus on two waves; the first (Wave I) in their adolescence (Grades 7-12) and the fifth (Wave V) in their late 30’s/early 40’s. A total of 6,504 students were a part of the multi-wave dataset of the AddHealth sample. The entirety of the research took place between 1994-2008.
An ANOVA hypothesis test revealed that among those participants who had had their first experience of sexual intercourse in AddHealth Wave I (my sample), those who reported a depression diagnosis in adulthood were not significantly more likely to have reported sexual intercourse in Wave I (Mean=14.50, s.d. ±2.45) compared to those who did not report a depression diagnosis in adulthood (Mean=14.97, s.d. ±2.10), F(1, 1423)=1.45, p=.23. The results fail to reject the null hypothesis. Age of first experience of sexual intercourse (O.R. 0.97, CI 0.92-1.02) is not significantly associated with the likelihood of having had a depression diagnosis in adulthood.
Final-QAC-201-Poster-1-1