Depression And Social Class
While individuals’ socio-economic status is the most vital social influence on health and peoples’ wellbeing, the distribution of wealth through our societies as a whole plays an important part. Many researchers have concluded many inequalities in the distribution of health by ethnicity, social class (including income, wealth and education), and gender. These inequalities have been calculated using many different results and outcomes including infant deaths, life expectancy, disability, mortality rates and morbidity. In this essay, I will be discussing both depression and alcoholism, and how they are affected by social class. Depression is a very common yet serious mood disorder. It is actually one of the most common forms of mental illnesses
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and it causes very severe symptoms that affect how you think and feel, and how you get on with daily activities, including eating, working, sleeping, etc. Another serious illness is alcoholism. A daily mail reporter concluded that alcohol has turned into a big killer of working class over the last one hundred years, according to scientists. Researchers have found out that some factors identified for development of this serious illness include unemployment, financial difficulties and the state of being not needed or useful anymore. Additionally, a very poor environment and segregation are also other vital factors that increase the risk of this mental illness. This essay will consider both the direct and indirect effects of poverty on the development of psychical and mental illnesses such as depression and alcoholism, in the context of the developing inequality between the rich and the poor. There is a clear established link between poverty and poor health.
The most common mental and physical illness is depression.
Depression is most common in later life, and affects almost five million of the thirty-one million Americans aged sixty-five and over (Blazer, 2009). Having a low-economic status is associated with a higher possibility of depression (Lorant et all 2003). There are many investigations and measures that have been carried out to find out more about the correlation between depression and social class. For example, one measurement used to measure depression was an adjusted version of the global depression scale of the Health and Daily Living Form (HDL; Moos et al, 1990). This checklist was made to evaluate how severe the symptoms of the major depression was, according to Research Diagnostic Criteria (Spitzer et al, 1978). This global depression scale consists of eighteen questions in which participants are asked to answer them by ticking yes or no in reference to how they felt over the past seven days, making it very reliable, with an 89% specificity. For example, one of the questions asked is “Are you basically satisfied with your life? YES / NO”. Additionally, Oakes & Rossi (2003) defined socio-economic status in regard to three types of resources. These were the material standard of living, skills and social relationships. The material standard of living was measured by factors such as income, poverty, financial strain and deprivation. They calculated the monthly net equivalent household income using the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (1982) equivalence scale. The index of deprivation invented by Weich & Lewis (1998) was then calculated. This index assigns one point for each of the
following:
1 annual household income in the first quintile; 2 no access to a car; 3 no saving from income; 4 fewer than four domestic household appliances from a list of ten; 5 living in rented accommodation; 6 living in a home with two or more major structural problems (such as damp, infestation or dry rot).
Moreover, poverty was defined as living in a household with an income “less than half of the population median income”. Financial strain was measured by a question asking “How well are you managing these days with your current income?” with the scores ranging from 0, meaning very well, to 5, meaning with great difficulty. Skills were assessed by the status of education and unemployment. Education was quantified using the number of year of education the participant has and unemployment was ranked 1 if the individual was unemployed but available for work for more than six months in the past year and as 0 otherwise. Finally, social relationships were measured by civic participation and living arrangements. Civic participation was described as participation is voluntary associations (Harpham et al, 2002), which was scored as 1 for those who were currently members of at least one social organisation, such as a sports organisation, or who were working voluntarily and as 0 otherwise. Then, living arrangements were measured as 1 for those who were living with a partner, and as 0 otherwise. It is clear to say people living in poorer conditions and are ranked low in the social class are more likely to suffer from depression, however, some may argue that depression can strike anyone, even those who are in the upper class. For example, the death of Robin Williams (2014) was due to depression. The world saw him as someone who enjoyed his lavish lifestyle, however, little did we know, he was hurting inside.
and it causes very severe symptoms that affect how you think and feel, and how you get on with daily activities, including eating, working, sleeping, etc. Another serious illness is alcoholism. A daily mail reporter concluded that alcohol has turned into a big killer of working class over the last one hundred years, according to scientists. Researchers have found out that some factors identified for development of this serious illness include unemployment, financial difficulties and the state of being not needed or useful anymore. Additionally, a very poor environment and segregation are also other vital factors that increase the risk of this mental illness. This essay will consider both the direct and indirect effects of poverty on the development of psychical and mental illnesses such as depression and alcoholism, in the context of the developing inequality between the rich and the poor. There is a clear established link between poverty and poor health.
The most common mental and physical illness is depression.
Depression is most common in later life, and affects almost five million of the thirty-one million Americans aged sixty-five and over (Blazer, 2009). Having a low-economic status is associated with a higher possibility of depression (Lorant et all 2003). There are many investigations and measures that have been carried out to find out more about the correlation between depression and social class. For example, one measurement used to measure depression was an adjusted version of the global depression scale of the Health and Daily Living Form (HDL; Moos et al, 1990). This checklist was made to evaluate how severe the symptoms of the major depression was, according to Research Diagnostic Criteria (Spitzer et al, 1978). This global depression scale consists of eighteen questions in which participants are asked to answer them by ticking yes or no in reference to how they felt over the past seven days, making it very reliable, with an 89% specificity. For example, one of the questions asked is “Are you basically satisfied with your life? YES / NO”. Additionally, Oakes & Rossi (2003) defined socio-economic status in regard to three types of resources. These were the material standard of living, skills and social relationships. The material standard of living was measured by factors such as income, poverty, financial strain and deprivation. They calculated the monthly net equivalent household income using the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (1982) equivalence scale. The index of deprivation invented by Weich & Lewis (1998) was then calculated. This index assigns one point for each of the
following:
1 annual household income in the first quintile; 2 no access to a car; 3 no saving from income; 4 fewer than four domestic household appliances from a list of ten; 5 living in rented accommodation; 6 living in a home with two or more major structural problems (such as damp, infestation or dry rot).
Moreover, poverty was defined as living in a household with an income “less than half of the population median income”. Financial strain was measured by a question asking “How well are you managing these days with your current income?” with the scores ranging from 0, meaning very well, to 5, meaning with great difficulty. Skills were assessed by the status of education and unemployment. Education was quantified using the number of year of education the participant has and unemployment was ranked 1 if the individual was unemployed but available for work for more than six months in the past year and as 0 otherwise. Finally, social relationships were measured by civic participation and living arrangements. Civic participation was described as participation is voluntary associations (Harpham et al, 2002), which was scored as 1 for those who were currently members of at least one social organisation, such as a sports organisation, or who were working voluntarily and as 0 otherwise. Then, living arrangements were measured as 1 for those who were living with a partner, and as 0 otherwise. It is clear to say people living in poorer conditions and are ranked low in the social class are more likely to suffer from depression, however, some may argue that depression can strike anyone, even those who are in the upper class. For example, the death of Robin Williams (2014) was due to depression. The world saw him as someone who enjoyed his lavish lifestyle, however, little did we know, he was hurting inside.