Abstract
Purpose: Rural adolescents often lack access to mental health care along with increased rates of depression and suicide completion. While psychological strengths have been associated with positive outcomes globally, little is known regarding the prevalence of these indicators (hope, self‐efficacy, resilience, optimism, and gratitude) among adolescents living in rural Texas. The purpose of this study was to describe how rural adolescents report their psychological strengths and examine the data for potential gender differences.
Design and Methods: A secondary analysis of cross‐sectional data was performed on the RStudio platform using tests of central tendency and inferential statistics. Results: There were 425 valid responses. Rural adolescents possessed indicators of psychological strengths at varying levels, with 16.9% reporting high resilience and 9.2% reporting high optimism. Males reported significantly greater levels of hope, self‐ efficacy, resilience, and gratitude with gender effect sizes ranging from 2% to 5%.
Practice Implications: Within school and community settings, nurses and adults who interact with rural adolescents should consider incorporating tailored strategies that promote growth of psychological strengths, with particular consideration for targeted screening and interventions for at‐risk groups.
Description
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. © 2025 The Author(s). Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Nursing published by Wiley Periodicals LLC
Publisher
WILEY
Date of publication
12-2025
Language
english
Persistent identifier
http://hdl.handle.net/10950/4929
Document Type
Article
Recommended Citation
Preston, Angela; Bullard, Jodi; Smith, Rachel; and Peppler, Ashlyn, "Gender Differences in Psychological Strengths Among Rural Adolescents" (2025). Nursing Faculty Publications and Presentations. Paper 58.
http://hdl.handle.net/10950/4929