Uncovering the hidden impacts of inequality on mental health: a global study

Shoukai Yu

doi:10.1038/s41398-018-0148-0

Abstract

Women are nearly twice as likely as men to suffer from mental illness. This gender disparity in depressive disorders may relate to social inequalities and living standards across nations. Currently, these disparities were not reflected at the level of health policies. This study utilized global data for depressive disorders and socioeconomic data from the United Nations’ World Bank databases and Global Burden of Disease database to demonstrate the correlation between social inequality and gender disparities in mental health. This study investigated the association among the ratio of female to male depressive disorder rates, gross domestic product, the GINI Index, and the gender inequality index for 122 countries. The research yielded some major findings. First, there exists a significant correlation between gender inequality and gender disparities in mental health. Second, the GINI index is significantly associated with male—but not female—depressive disorder rates. Third, gender disparities in depressive disorders are associated with a country’s wealth. These findings can help to inform society, policy-makers, and clinicians to improve the overall health level globally.

Highlights

Introduction According to the World HealthOrganization (WHO), depressive disorders are major contributors to the world’s health burden; they affect approximately 350 million people worldwide[1,2,3]
The results together demonstrate that Gender Inequality Index (GII) index is a hidden factor that correlated with the log-transformed ratio of female to male rates of depressive disorders
Compared to the other two independent variables, the cluster tendency for Gross Domestic Product (GDP) index is stronger. This is one of the first studies to successfully provide statistical evidence of an association between gender disparities in psychiatric disorders and social inequalities at a global level. These results contribute to the growing evidence that social inequality has an independent effect on population-specific depressive disorders[24,48]

Summary

Introduction

Introduction According to the World HealthOrganization (WHO), depressive disorders are major contributors to the world’s health burden; they affect approximately 350 million people worldwide[1,2,3]. Women are nearly twice as likely as men to suffer from mental illness[4,5,6]. This gender disparity in mental health is reported across diverse geographical regions, societies, populations, and social contexts, there is a dearth of research that explores a link between the impacts of social inequalities and gender disparities on mental health. A growing body of research indicates that psychiatric disorders are largely caused by a combination of stress, environmental, neurobiological, and genetic factors. These poorly understood factors significantly limit the development of effective treatments for these disorders. Attention to social factors, especially with regard to inequality, is critical in approaches to mental health; these factors can be improved dramatically through the implementation of appropriate governmental policies and heightened community awareness

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Discussion

Conclusion