Research Proposal Paper
by
<Your Name>
26th August 2014
<Lecturer’s Name and Course Number>
Does Height Affect Depression in Individuals?
Abstract Many theories have that depression has evolved as an adaptation to adversity or defeat thus predictions stemming from these models is that individual attributes associated with defeat in a given social environment could be risk factors for depression. We hypothesize here that in individuals in today 's society where there are a lot of factors of importance in the existence of the human species, as Ingham (2014) puts it, "being too short OR too tall heightens risk of depression" as compared to the average height. Random sample of individuals in all the categories of height is to be considered and evaluated to see whether the hypothesis will pass.
Introduction Height and depression in a way go hand in hand that brings up the issue of "Does height affect depression in individuals?" Surprisingly, this question remains a matter of debate (Ambler et al., 2013) in many psychological societies. In particular, researchers cannot reach a consensus on whether short stature confers health and psychological disadvantages. Underwood (1991) established that short people of both genders are subject to stigmatization and prejudice. Conversely, tall stature is associated with perception of higher status and achievement (Jackson & Ervin; Lechelt, 1975). However, it remains unclear whether psychosocial stress associated with short stature leads to substantial depression. A number of large epidemiological studies have found short stature to be associated with poorer mental health (Cheung et al., 2013) and lower health-related quality of life ( Christensen et al., 2007). In addition, other studies have concluded that height has negligible effect on health-related quality of life ( Busschbach et al., 1997; Coste et al., 2012). Some studies on short stature children did not find them significantly
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