(PS12-52) Help-seeking Patterns Among Young and Older Adults Following Bereavement

Bereavement is a process experienced by most, if not all people, during their lifetime. Although the experience of bereavement is near-universal, the response shows variability, with research suggesting up to 10-20% of bereaved individuals have intense, chronic, and complicated grief reactions. This is notable as there is evidence that depressive symptoms following loss are less likely to evoke recommendations to seek help than depressive symptoms without an identifiable cause. These findings may be particularly salient for younger and older adult populations as these age groups are statistically less likely to seek help. Understanding help-seeking patterns within and between these two populations will further our understanding of help-seeking for depression when bereavement has, and has not occurred. The current study investigated correlates of recommending help-seeking for others and how the age of both the bereaved and potential recommender affect perceived need for services. It was hypothesized that older adults and bereaved protagonists would be perceived as less in need of treatment, and that perceived depressive disorder in protagonists would predict increased help-seeking across conditions. The final sample (N = 358) consisted of both young (n = 128) and older adults (n = 230).  The young adult participants were undergraduate students (M age =20.70) from a private Midwestern university. The older adult participants were community dwelling adults (M age = 72.89) recruited through local adult learning institutes. Participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions crossed for protagonist age (young/old) and context (bereaved/no precipitant) where they read and responded to a vignette describing depression.  All participants completed measures of help-seeking recommendations, personal bereavement, help-seeking history, and demographic information. A 2 (participant age) x 2 (protagonist age) x 2(bereaved/not bereaved) ANOVA found that both older and younger adults were more likely to recommend that those experiencing depression in the context of bereavement should seek help more than those experiencing symptoms of depression outside of bereavement, F(1, 358) = 5.61, p = .018; both older and younger adults recommended help seeking more to the young protagonist in the context of bereavement than to the older adult protagonist, F(1, 358) = 5.58, p = .019; both young and older adults were equally likely to recommend help-seeking in general (F(1, 358) = .043, p = .835) and younger adults were no more likely to recommend older adults seek help than the older adults themselves (F(1, 358) = .007, p = .935). Finally, regression analyses indicated perceived depressive disorder in the protagonist predicted increased help-seeking recommendations across all conditions when controlling for participant age, R² = .101, F(1,355) = 39.96, p < .001. The present study has the potential to inform advocacy efforts for help-seeking across multiple populations including those experiencing depression and bereavement across age groups. Future research should continue to examine help-seeking patterns among populations underutilizing mental health services and identify reasons why these patterns occur (e.g., ageism, stigma, etc.).