Predicting Adolescent Psychological Vulnerability Based on the Interaction of Family, Social, and Digital Factors

Abstract

This study aimed to identify and explain an interactive model of family, social, and digital factors involved in the development and intensification of psychological vulnerability among adolescents. This qualitative study employed an inductive thematic analysis approach. The participants were 24 adolescents aged 13–18 years living in Tehran, Iran, who were selected through purposive maximum-variation sampling according to age, gender, family structure, socioeconomic background, and level of digital-media use. Data were collected exclusively through individual semi-structured interviews lasting approximately 45–75 minutes. Initial theoretical saturation was achieved after the twenty-second interview, followed by two confirmatory interviews to ensure that no substantively new concepts emerged. All interviews were transcribed verbatim and analyzed in accordance with Braun and Clarke’s six-phase thematic analysis procedure. NVivo 14 software was used to organize, code, retrieve, and compare the qualitative data. Participant checking, peer review, analytic memoing, negative-case analysis, and maintenance of an audit trail were applied to enhance the credibility and dependability of the findings. Five main categories were identified: “erosion of emotional security and family regulation,” “pressures of belonging, comparison, and rejection in social relationships,” “digital stress and life under continuous evaluation,” “disruption of daily rhythms and weakened self-regulation,” and “cross-system reinforcing cycles among family, social, and digital environments.” The findings indicated that family conflict, parental psychological unavailability, intrusive control, insufficient social support, academic pressure, peer rejection, bullying, online social comparison, fear of missing out, cyberharassment, and nighttime smartphone use jointly intensified anxiety, depressive mood, irritability, worthlessness, rumination, and withdrawal. Supportive parent–adolescent communication, school connectedness, secure friendships, meaningful offline activities, and digital literacy emerged as protective conditions. Adolescent psychological vulnerability should be understood as a relational and ecological phenomenon rather than the consequence of an isolated personal deficit or a single digital behavior. Assessment and intervention should simultaneously address family relationships, school and peer experiences, social support, digital practices, sleep routines, and adolescents’ emotion-regulation capacities. The proposed qualitative model may guide multidimensional screening and preventive interventions, although its predictive propositions require subsequent quantitative and longitudinal testing.