Past concussion, depression, and social support

Abstract

Introduction: Concussions are a major health concern in the United States. Concussions have been linked to multiple health issues, from CTE to depression. While the link between concussions and depression has been established, there is a lack of research regarding what may influence that relationship. Low levels of social support have been found to be a risk factor for depression. Because of a required withdrawal from social activities due to concussion protocol, it is our hypothesis that perceived social support is a mediating factor in depression after concussions.

Methods: Participants were recruited from a large Midwestern university and answered questionnaires online. They were asked about their concussion history including questions about medical diagnoses, as well as questions from the Rivermead Post Concussion Questionnaire. They were also completed questionnaires assessing perceived social support and symptoms of depression.

Results: There were no significant differences between the concussion group and non-concussion group on any of our variables. However, concussion symptom severity was positively associated with anxiety and negatively associated with overall psychological health.

Discussion: While our results do not show a significant relationship between concussions and depression, the small sample size likely resulted in low statistical power to detect a significant effect. While these results do not indicate that social support is important in post-concussion depression, future research should measure the variables with a larger sample, while also examine more related variables such as anxiety and overall psychological health.