Adolescence is regarded as a “stormy” period full of stress, during which individuals are prone to experience internalizing problems herein consisting of depression and anxiety (Costello, Swendsen, Rose, & Dierker, 2008; Zahn-Waxler, Klimes-Dougan, & Slattery, 2000). Previous epidemiological studies revealed that 8% of adolescents meet diagnostic criteria for depressive disorder and almost one-quarter suffer from anxiety disorder (Kessler et al., 2012). Given that these internally-oriented problems are associated with not only functional impairment and suicidal behavior in adolescence but also increased risk for mental disorders in adulthood (Balazs et al., 2013), it is crucial to better understand the psychosocial factors of these problems.
Research has established that social capital plays an important role in adolescent internalizing problems. Social capital refers to the tangible or intangible resources that are made available to individuals through all of their strong and weak “social ties” (e.g., family, close friends and strangers), including emotional, information and economic support (Selim, Scott, & Kaye, 2021; Spottswood & Wohn, 2020; Williams, 2006). According to Social Capital Theory, social capital can help individuals cope with vulnerabilities during adolescence, thereby effectively improving their psychological adjustment (Abbas & Mesch, 2018; Olsson, 2011; Williams, 2006). In recent studies, social capital has been separated into online and offline aspects for further investigation and discussion (Williams, 2006). On one hand, offline social capital is viewed as an important protective factor for adolescent internalizing problems (Olsson, 2011), and numerous studies support this relationship. For example, a meta-analysis reported that social capital is negatively associated with internalizing problems (depression and social anxiety) in children and adolescents (McPherson et al., 2014). Similarly, Awgu, Magura, and Coryn (2016) as well as Hirota et al. (2021) respectively found that a negatively predictive effect of social capital for both depressive disorder and anxiety disorder (according to DSM-IV criteria) in samples of American adolescents. Additionally, online social capital is considered an asset which is even more effective for adolescent psychological adjustment, researchers pointed out, given that online social capital is less limited by constraints of time and space to be acquired and thus provides broader support (Liu, Ni, & Niu, 2020; Maghsoudi, Shapka, & Wisniewski, 2020). However, some studies have reported mixed conclusions. For example, some research found that online social capital may lead to individuals feeling stressed or contribute to hate-oriented behaviors among adolescent samples (Kaakinen et al., 2018; Maghsoudi et al., 2020). Therefore, the role of online social capital for adolescent internalizing symptoms, and the extent to which this role can be achieved, requires further exploration. Furthermore, past research has tended to examine different aspects of social capital in isolation and mostly been based on a variable-centered approach, person-centered studies are needed to better understand how the two kinds of co-existing social capital interact and how different combinations relate to adolescent internalizing problems.
Many possible combinations of social capital could, in theory, occur in any given population. On one hand, the rich-get-richer hypothesis of Internet use suggests that individuals with higher degrees of socialization are more likely to actively engage in online social interactions (Cheng, Wang, Sigerson, & Chau, 2019). That means more offline social capital could foster more robust online social capital accumulation and convergent profiles with similar levels of social capital across online and offline contexts are likely to emerge. On the other hand, the social compensation hypothesis holds that individuals lacking offline social capital have a strong motivation to seek online activities to gratify their unmet needs for socializing and thus acquire online social capital (Chan & Cheng, 2016; Kraut et al., 2002). Here, divergent profiles can be expected to occur, that is, one with low offline social capital, but high online social capital. Meanwhile, these convergent and divergent social capital profiles might be associated with adolescent internalizing symptoms. Specifically, an additive effect of social capital might emerge, in which profiles with consistently high social capital across networks would report better psychological outcomes (e.g., less internalizing symptoms) (Heerde & Hemphill, 2018). Although existing work has yet to examine social capital patterns and adolescent internalizing symptoms, findings from prior person-centered studies examining social support may provide some insights (Chan, Sharkey, Nylund-Gibson, Dowdy, & Furlong, 2022; Ciarrochi, Morin, Sahdra, Litalien, & Parker, 2017; Jager, 2011). For example, Chan et al. (2022) reported that the convergent and divergent social support profiles and their associations with adolescent psychological and academic functioning, confirming that there is an optimal social support profile (consistently high support across multiple networks) conducive to the adolescent psychological adjustment. In sum, the examination of social capital profiles by applying a person-centered approach may help us to understand how online and offline social capital concurrently related adolescent internalizing problems, potentially clarifying the inconsistencies within the existing literature. It may also shed light on useful information for efficient preventions and interventions of adolescent internalizing problems.
Latent profile analysis (LPA) is a person-centered approach that identify unobservable subgroups within a population by maximizing within-class homogeneity and between-class heterogeneity among indicator variables of interest. In addition, LPA allows for direct incorporation of covariates, predictors, and distal outcomes in the model (Asparouhov & Muthen, 2014). Accordingly, the current study aimed to examine perceived social capital patterns association with internalizing symptoms among adolescent by applying LPA. Specifically, the primary aim was to characterize adolescent social capital typologies and the secondary aim was to examine profile differences in internalizing problems (depressive and anxiety symptoms).