Published Paper Details:

Youth mental health disparities in modern-day India are a product of the interplay of embedded social hierarchies with burgeoning digital realities. We present a comprehensive secondary data analysis that triangulates peer-reviewed academic literature, civil society reports, governmental reports, NGO reports, and statistics on cybercrime and cyber offenses from 2018-2025 to shed light on the sociopsychological basis of online discrimination and the implications to youth mental health. Results yielded higher prevalence rates of caste slurs (28%), gender harassment (34%), cyberbullying (29%) and hate speech - especially for marginalized youth; substantial declines in psychological outcomes for self-concept; trauma indicators including acute stress disorders seen at different levels; different coping strategies - heavily mediated by access to digital - urban youth having access to peered networks and rural or caste marginalized youth having close networks of family and traditions. We interpret these findings using sociopsychology with a social identity, stereotype threat, and social stress lens - how offline, deep-seated disparities will seek to reproduce or replicate in the online space - exclusions from an online space also become a mode of inequity that limits access to mental health resources and building resiliency. Triangulating the sociopsychological knowledge around youth and sociopsychological issues of digital equity provided urgency and an imperative for a converged action agenda for policy change - policy change is needed and will need strong, culture-specific legal frameworks.