Poverty and Self-Reported Mental Disorders: Findings from the Healthy Aging in Neighborhoods of Diversity Across the Life Span Study (HANDLS)

Purpose To examine the contributions of individual-level variables, specifically poverty levels, on risks of mental health problems among HANDLS participants. Methods Study participants were 597 African Americans and 168 white adults from a population-based study. In addition to individual-level characteristics including age, gender, marital status, education, race, self-rated health, insurance coverage, global cognitive function, and depressive symptoms, participants were also assessed for the presence of self-reported mental illness symptoms. Mental disorders including obsessive-compulsive, psychosis, social phobia, and generalized anxiety were extracted from the Psychiatric Diagnostic Screening Questionnaire (PDSQ). Poverty levels were defined using the federal definition of poverty status, such that participants were considered to be poor if they were at or below the 125% poverty threshold. Participants were divided into four groups: poor African Americans (n=428), poor Whites (n=34), advantaged African Americans (n=169) and advantaged Whites (n=134). Results Several multivariate logistic regression approaches were used. For all analyses, the advantaged white group was used as the reference group. Adjusting for other confounding variables, poor African Americans were 2.88 times more likely to have obsessive-compulsive disorder and 2.13 times more likely to have psychosis disorder than advantaged Whites. Conclusion Poor mental health is associated with low socioeconomic status. Our findings emphasize the potential importance of poverty as a risk factor for specific mental health disorders.