Social status inequality and depression in Europe

Marii Paskov,Lindsay Richards

doi:10.1177/00207152211022419

Marii Paskov, Lindsay Richards

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1177/00207152211022419

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Abstract

It is theorized that income inequality is an indicator of status inequality and should therefore be associated with adverse health outcomes. In this article, we propose a novel way to capture status inequality more directly by measuring the distribution of self-perceived status in a society. We investigate whether status inequality in a society is associated with depression in the population. We show, first, that there is only a moderate association between subjective social status inequality and income inequality. Second, we provide evidence that depression is higher in countries with higher status inequality and that our novel measure of status inequality is more strongly associated with depression than the conventionally used income inequality measure. However, results are susceptible to influential country cases.

Highlights

There is a long-standing literature on the association between socio-economic status and health outcomes whereby outcomes are worse for individuals occupying positions lower in the social hierarchy and better for those higher up (Marmot, 2004)
We propose that looking at inequality in social status (SSS) would serve as a more direct indicator of status inequality within countries, when compared with the more usual measurement via income inequality
Our findings show that subjective status inequality within countries is associated with depression of the inhabitants of that country

Summary

Introduction

There is a long-standing literature on the association between socio-economic status and health outcomes whereby outcomes are worse for individuals occupying positions lower in the social hierarchy and better for those higher up (Marmot, 2004). A more recent literature increasingly turns attention to the relationship between social context and population health (Beckfield et al, 2013) In the latter line of research, one of the key contextual explanatory variables is income inequality. One prominent theory to explain the relationship between income inequality and health is the psychosocial mechanism which posits that income is not merely a means by which material needs are fulfilled but is widely understood by individuals as recognition of social worth and social status (Layte and Whelan, 2014; Marmot, 2004; Ridgeway, 2014; Wilkinson and Pickett, 2010)

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