Table 1.

Descriptive Statistics of Variables by Gender, National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) 1979, Weighted Means and Standard Deviation

	Overall (N= 3,562)		Men (N= 1,965)		Women (N= 1,597)		Gender Differences^a	VIF

	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.	Mean	S.D.
Dependent variables ^b
CES-D 1992 (0–21: the most depressed)	1.65	.02	1.53	.03	1.79	.03	^***
CES-D 40+/50+ (0–21: the most depressed) ^c	1.35	.02	1.21	.03	1.54	.04	^***
Independent variable
Self-esteem 1987 (0–30: the highest self-esteem)	24.18	.08	24.39	.11	23.9	.12	^**	1.15
Mediators
Marijuana use 1988 (0–6: 100 or more occasions)	2.37	.04	2.53	.05	2.16	.05	^***	1.7
Cocaine use 1988 (0–6: 100 or more occasions)	.89	.03	0.96	.04	.82	.04	^*	1.67
Alcohol-urge 1989 (0–4: 3+ times in past year)	1.18	.03	1.33	.04	.98	.04	^***	1.1
Alcohol-addiction 1989 (0–4: 3+ times in past year)	.05	.01	0.05	.01	.04	.01	-	1.06
Sociodemographic variables
Age 1979	17.72	.05	17.72	.06	17.71	.07	-	2.98
Race/Ethnicity							-
Hispanic	.06		.06		.05			1.42
Black	.10		.09		.10			1.39
Non-black, Non-Hispanic (reference)	.85		.85		.85			-
Enrollment status 1979							-
Not Enrolled, completed less than 12th grade (reference)	.08		.08		.07			-
Enrolled in high school	.50		.52		.48			4.33
Enrolled in college	.18		.18		.19			2.63
Not enrolled, high school graduate	.24		.22		.26			2.9
Poverty (=1) 1979	.09		.08		.09		-	1.22
Mother’s education (0–20)	11.97	.05	11.98	.06	11.96	.07	-	2.02
Father’s education (0–20)	12.31	.07	12.35	.09	12.27	.09	-	1.9
# of siblings 1979	3.12	.04	3.06	.05	3.19	.06	-	1.23
Living with mother & father (=1) 1979	.81		.81		.80		-	1.05
Rural (=1) 1979	.21		.22		.20		-	1.12
Racial discrimination (=1) 1982	.05		.06		.04		^**	1.09

Note:

Chi-square test and t-test (two-tailed) with weights are used to see the gender differences

p<.05;

^**

p<.01;

^***

p<.001

CES-D has been transformed using the square-root.

Because of missing observations, the numbers of samples when respondents are 40’s or 50’s are decreased to 1,676 and 1,401, for male and female, respectively.