Gender specificity of psychological help-seeking among Russian adolescents

Abstract

The influence of social factors in adolescents seeking professional psychological help seems to be an urgent scientific and practical problem in both the foreign and Russian contexts. This article identifies the specifics of strategies and scenarios for help-seeking among boys and girls aged 14-17 based on the results of a quantitative sociological study of adolescents in Russia. An online survey of a representative sample (N = 17,000) aimed to measure help-seeking rates among two gender groups, an assessment of this experience, the prevalence of various coping strategies and social attitudes towards psychological help among Russian adolescents. The results showed significant differences in the experience of boys and girls in these aspects. In particular, female respondents more often had experience of seeking the services of a psychologist and used this practice to solve their mental problems. Young men were much less likely to seeking professional psychological help, which may be due to stigmatizing social attitudes. The revealed trends facilitated to propose key direction for future research of gender differences in the level of mental health literacy among Russian adolescents as well as their vulnerability to the social factor of stigma.