The Effect of Early Teenage Pregnancy on Depression and Mental Health in Malaysia

The study focused on analysing the mental health such as emotional, social and psychological well-beings of the teenage girls towards the pregnancy and investigate the various factors such as sexual relationship associated with teenage pregnancy.

The study took a cross-sectional approach and adopted convenient sampling method for data collection. Data was collected from teenage girls aged 12 to 21 years from the state of Sabah. Data collection accomplished through survey data assessment, with survey responses data being collected through structured questionnaire as the effective research tool. The collected data is then statistically analysed for regression, ANOVA, one-way ANOVA and correlation analysis.

Exploratory data analysis about the participants were explicated using frequency analysis. The statistical Test outcomes delineated the occurrence of significant relationship between engagements in sexual relationship with the age, marital status, distance of education, school attitude, self-esteem, self-efficacy, perceived social support, Peer community influences, Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS), coping ability variables and other predictor variables. Similarly One-Way anova test, reveals the existence of statistical significant mean differences among age attribute of teenage girls, their engagement in sexual activity, predictor variables and their demographic details.

The life of the teenagers who are engaged in sexual activity were observed to be more challenging in terms of medically, psychologically, and physically. The present study strongly recommends that social activists would adopt possible measures in revealing a better solution towards the teenage pregnancy.