Mental health and school adaptation among immigrant, refugee, and non-immigrant adolescents

This study compared the mental health and school adaptation of first- and second-generation immigrant, refugee, and non-immigrant adolescents in Finland. The purpose of the study was to examine, first, whether and how immigrant/refugee status was a risk factor for youth's mental health and/or school adaptation. Second, we examined the potential role of two psychosocial resources, namely teacher support and adolescents' sense of school belonging, in promoting and/or protecting immigrant and/or refugee adolescents' mental health and school adaptation. Key findings from the random-intercept nested (K schools = 828) population-based ( N = 207,873) analyses were that refugees' mental health and school adaptation were at greater risk compared to those of first-generation immigrant youth, who were at greater risk compared to youth born in Finland (both ethnic Finns and second-generation immigrant-origin youth). However, second-generation immigrant-origin adolescents' mental health and school adaptation did not differ from those of their ethnic-Finn peers. Teacher support was the most important psychosocial resource for first-generation immigrant and refugee youth compared to youth born in Finland. Both teacher support and sense of school belonging protected, playing an extra role for, the mental health and school adaptation of refugee as compared to first-generation youth. The results have significant educational policy implications.