Abstract: Objective To investigate the influence of adaptability on depressive symptoms in adolescents and to provide a basis for promoting mental health of adolescents.Methods Using stratified random cluster sampling,we recruited 2 902 junior and senior high school students from 12 high schools in Suzhou city during March 2015.We adopted a self-designed demography questionnaire,Adolescent Adaptation Scale (revised edition),and Symptom Checklist-90 (SCL-90)for a self-administered survey among the students.Then we used Excel 2010 and Epi Data 3.10 in data preparation and SPSS 18.0 in data analyses.Results Univariate analyses showed that the incident of depressive symptoms was influenced by age (odds ratio,95% confidence interval:1.815,1.531-2.151;aged 15-19 years compared to<15 years),grade (senior grade three:3.334,2.421-4.592,senior grade two:3.217,2.324-4.453,senior grade one:3.593,2.625-4.918,junior grade three:2.992,2.269-4.127,and junior grade two:2.204,1.588-3.059 compared to junior grade one),being a freshman (0.739,0.621-0.880),with migrant working parents (2.071,1.677-2.557),emotional adaptation (0.847,0.826-0.869),social adaptation (0.836,0.815-0.858),and study adaptation (0.833,0.811-0.856)(P<0.05 for all);but the incident of depressive symptoms was not influenced by gender,familial economic status,and development environment among the students.The results of multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that gender,grade,familial economic condition,parental marriage status,parents' migrant working,emotional adaptation,social adaptation,and study adaptation were statistically significant dependent variables for the incident of depression symptoms (P<0.05 for all).Conclusion Adaptability,as a protective factor,is reversely correlated with depressive symptoms among adolescent students.