Objective To explore the associations among depressive symptoms, psychological resilience, and mental health literacy in adolescents, so as to provide new insights for interventions targeting adolescent depressive symptoms.

Methods A stratified multistage cluster sampling method was employed to select 2 723 students aged 10‒18 years from primary and secondary schools at different educational stages in Putuo District of Shanghai from December 2024 to January 2025. The Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9, total score 0‒27, with a score ≥10 indicating positive depressive symptoms), the Resilience Scale for Chinese Adolescents (RSCA, total score 27‒135), and a mental health core knowledge awareness questionnaire (total score 0‒10) were utilized to assess depressive symptoms, psychological resilience, and mental health literacy, respectively. A network model was constructed using the nine PHQ-9 items (including anhedonia, depressed mood, sleep problems, fatigue, appetite problems, guilt, trouble concentrating, psychomotor symptoms, and self-harm or suicidal thoughts), five RSCA dimensions (including goal orientation, emotion regulation, positive cognition, family support, and interpersonal assistance), and the total mental health literacy score as nodes to analyze the association structure among these nodes. Standardized node strength, standardized expected influence, and standardized bridge expected influence were calculated.

Results The PHQ-9 score was 4.62±5.27, yielding a positive screening rate for depressive symptoms of 15.28%. The scores of the RSCA and mental health literacy were 97.71±20.58 and 9.00 (8.00, 10.00), respectively. Network analyses revealed that emotion regulation and depressed mood were core nodes in the network (standardized strength values were 1.74 and 0.97); they constituted the main connection between depressive symptoms and psychological resilience networks (edge weight was -0.17). Mental health literacy and positive cognition served as the main bridge nodes linking depressive symptoms and psychological resilience (standardized bridge expected influence values were 1.42 and 1.27).

Conclusion Depressed mood, emotion regulation, positive cognition, and mental health literacy are closely associated with depressive symptoms, psychological resilience, and mental health literacy in adolescents. Strengthening interventions targeting emotion regulation, positive cognition and mental health literacy may contribute to the prevention and control of depressive symptoms among adolescents.