Association Between Parental Nativity and Mental Health Among U.S. Adolescents: Findings from the National Health Interview Survey, 2022 - 2024

Adolescents aged 12–17 in the 2022–2024 National Health Interview Survey with at least one foreign-born parent had lower odds of anxiety (OR=0.62, 95% CI: 0.54–0.71) than those with U.S.-born parents.

• Why it matters: Prior work shows high mental health burden among immigrants, but evidence for their children is mixed, and it is unclear whether parental nativity relates to adolescents’ mental health across sex and race/ethnicity.
• What they did: Using pooled cross-sectional NHIS data (n=12,540), the study applied inverse probability of treatment weighting and nearest-neighbor matching to adjust confounders, then used survey-weighted logistic regression for anxiety, depression, behavioral difficulties, and peer relationships.
• The result: In the IPTW analysis, foreign-born parental nativity was linked to lower odds of depression (OR=0.71, 95% CI: 0.60–0.84) and behavioral difficulties (OR=0.56, 95% CI: 0.43–0.72), while relationship difficulties were not significantly different (OR=0.97, 95% CI: 0.74–1.26).

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