Predictors of psychopathology among Nigerian adolescents: the role of psychosocial, demographics, personality and medical condition reports domains

Background: Psychopathology among adolescents has become a global concern in the last decade. Objective: The aim of this study was to identify the predictors of psychopathology among adolescents in Ibadan region using a multi-theoretical approach. Methods: Eight hundred and eighty-nine (889) male and female adolescents drawn from different parts of Ibadan region of the South-West Nigeria, participated in the study. The study is a cross-sectional survey and adopted an ex-post facto design. A questionnaire divided into six sections, with two versions was used for data collection. Analysis of data involved multiple/stepwise regressions, F-test T-test. SPSS 10.0 computer programme was utilized for all analyses. Results: Data showed that all the predictors jointly contributed 37% (P 0.0001) to the prediction of reported psychopathology. The domains of psychosocial, personality, demographic and medical condition reports all independently and significantly predicted psychopathology among the adolescents but psychosocial domain had the highest contribution of 16% (P 0.0001). Prevalence rate for psychopathology among the sampled adolescents was 0.152 (15.2%) at the criteria of one standard deviation above the mean. Conclusion: It is concluded that a multi-theoretical approach to the understanding of psychopathology among adolescents will be more appropriate in the Nigerian community. Results have implication for further assessment and treatments. Parents are advised to report any behavioural dysfunction observed in their wards to experts early enough to avoid degeneration to greater psychopathology in the later years.