Mental Distress - Mental Distress and Social Disparities Among African-Americans

Mental Distress and Social Disparities Among African-Americans

The social disparities associated with mental health in the African-American community have remained constant over time. According to the Office of Minority Health, African- Americans comprise 12.9% of the U.S. population, yet they are 30% more likely than European Americans to report serious psychological distress. Moreover African-Americans are more likely to have Major Depressive Disorder, and communicate higher instances of intense symptoms/disability. For this reason, researchers have attempted to examine the sociological causes and systemic inequalities which contribute to these disparities in order to highlight issues for further investigation. Nonetheless, much of the research on the mental well-being of African-Americans is unable to separate race, culture, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, or behavioral and biological factors. According to Hunter and Schmidt (2010), there are three distinct beliefs embraced by African-Americans which speak to their socio-cultural experience in the United States: a perception of racism, stigma associated with mental illness, and the importance of physical health. Therefore, discrimination within the healthcare community and larger society, attitudes related to mental health, and general physical health contribute largely to the mental well-being of African-Americans.

African Americans also suffer the most in job related racial harassment issues at an alarming rate. For this reason African Americans suffer emotional distress/depression because racism still run high in this country. While racial harassment is alive and well on the job it is often difficult to prove because it happen in a subtle way, but yet it affect every African American who experience racial harassment on the job emotionally.