Department of Psychology, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, CO, USA.
Department of Psychology, Colorado College, 14 East Cache la Poudre Street, Colorado Springs, CO, 80903, USA.
BMC Psychol. 2024 Aug 14;12(1):441. doi: 10.1186/s40359-024-01804-8.
Depression is present in all societies and affects members of all racial and ethnic groups. However, attitudes about depression differ across groups and have been shown to impact help-seeking behaviors, preferences for treatments, and compliance with treatments.
Taking a cross-cultural approach, this project used a case vignette of depression to examine race/ethnic group differences in attitudes about depression and its treatment among young adults in the U.S.
Data analyses revealed significant racial/ethnic group differences in attitudes as well as the treatments/strategies participants reported they would use. Gender x race/ethnicity interactions revealed that White and Multiracial/ethnic men were more likely to believe the vignette character should find a partner to help with symptoms, while White and Multiracial/ethnic women did not endorse those strategies. Hispanic men and women did not show a gender difference in that strategy, but gender differences were observed in other strategies. In a rare comparison, majority-minority Multiracial/ethnic participants (i.e., White selected as one of their races/ethnicities) rated identified helpers and treatments similarly to White participants and significantly higher than multiple-minority Multiracial participants (i.e., White not selected as one of their races/ethnicities).
Findings supported previous research that indicates different U.S. racial/ethnic group ideas of depression and its treatment are potentially linked with cultural values, and we suggest that investigating these more fine-grained group differences can help to inform treating professionals as well as public health messages.
抑郁症存在于所有社会中，影响着所有种族和民族群体的成员。然而，不同群体对抑郁症的态度存在差异，这些态度已被证明会影响寻求帮助的行为、对治疗的偏好以及对治疗的依从性。
本项目采用跨文化方法，通过使用抑郁症病例简述来检查美国年轻人对抑郁症及其治疗的态度方面的种族/民族群体差异。
数据分析显示，不同种族/民族群体的态度以及参与者报告的治疗/策略存在显著差异。性别与种族/民族的交互作用表明，白人男性和多种族/少数民族男性更有可能认为病例简述中的角色应该寻找伴侣来帮助缓解症状，而白人女性和多种族/少数民族女性则不支持这些策略。西班牙裔男性和女性在该策略上没有表现出性别差异，但在其他策略上则存在性别差异。在一个罕见的比较中，多数少数种族/少数民族的多种族/少数民族参与者（即选择白人作为他们的种族/民族之一）对识别出的帮助者和治疗方法的评价与白人参与者相似，且明显高于少数多种族/少数民族的多种族/少数民族参与者（即选择白人不作为他们的种族/民族之一）。
研究结果支持了之前的研究，表明不同的美国种族/民族群体对抑郁症及其治疗的观念与文化价值观有关，我们认为，研究这些更细致的群体差异可以帮助治疗专业人员以及公共卫生信息的传播。
