Urbanization and mental health in developing countries: A research role for social scientists, public health professionals and social psychiatrists

doi:10.1016/0277-9536(94)90332-8

Social Science & Medicine

Volume 39, Issue 2, July 1994, Pages 233-245

https://doi.org/10.1016/0277-9536(94)90332-8 Get rights and content

Abstract

Urbanization in developing countries involves changes in social support and life events which have been shown to affect mental health; mainly depression and anxiety, particularly among low income women. Although depressive and anxiety disorders have a high prevalence and account for a large proportion of visits to primary health services there is little international health research in this field. The determinants, extent and outcome of the association between urbanization and mental health requires multi-disciplinary research by social scientists, social psychiatrists and public health professionals. An appreciation of different conceptual models and associated methods is required before effective research can begin. Other issues such as the avoidance of environmental determinism; the separation of macro-social and micro-social variables; the weakness of urban/rural comparisons of mental health; the role of rural to urban migration; the debates about cross-cultural psychiatry; and the policy-relevance of research, all need consideration in the development of research into this rapidly emerging, but relatively neglected problem.

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Urbanization and mental health in developing countries: A research role for social scientists, public health professionals and social psychiatrists

Abstract

Soc. Sci. Med.

Soc. Sci. Med.

Soc. Sci. Med.

Compr. Psychiat.

Biol. Psychiat.

Soc. Sci. Med.

Soc. Sci. Med.

Soc. Sci. Med.

Soc. Sci. Med.

Soc. Sci. Med.

Soc. Sci. Med.

Am. J. Med.

Mental health and development of children and adolescents in cities

Social relationships and health

Science

Preface-Part II: The study of mood disorders in international perspective

World Development Report 1993: Investing in Health

Psychiatric morbidity in developing countries and American psychiatry's role in international health

Hospital community Psychiat.

Urbanization and Mental Disorders: An Overview of Theory and Research, and Recommendations for Interventions and Research

Ecological correlations and the behaviour of individuals

Am. Sociol. Rev.

Mental health and the urban environment: some doubts and second thoughts

J. Hlth soc. Behav.

The mental health of women with children living in deprived areas of Great Britain: The role of living conditions, poverty and unemployment

Depression: a radical social perspective

Depression, somatization and the new ‘cross-cultural psychiatry’

Soc. Sci. Med.

Anthropology and psychiatry: The uneasy alliance

Transcultural Psychiat. Res. Rev.

Works and Lives: The Anthropologist as Author

From categories to contexts: A decade of the ‘new cross-cultural psychiatry’

Br. J. Psychiat.

The Rules of Sociological Method

Psychiatric epidemiology across cultures: Current issues and trends

Transcultural Psychiat. Res. Rev.

Preface

Theoretical and empirical issues in differentiating depression from anxiety

The Detection of Psychiatric Illness by Questionnaire

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders

Epidemiological studies of depression: definition and case finding

Evaluation of methods for the treatment of mental disorder

Preface

The Stress of Life

Stress without Distress

Life stress and depression

Urbanization and minor psychiatric morbidity: A community study in Taiwan

Soc. Psychiat. psychiat. Epidemiol.

Mental health and the urban crisis

Am. J. Orthopsychiat.

The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness

Traditionalism and mental health in the South Pacific: a reexamination of an old hypothesis

Psychol. Med.

Psychiatric disorders in urban settings

Symptoms of depression in two communities

Psychol. Med.

Urbanization and mental health: psychiatric morbidity, suicide and violence in the state of Victoria

Aust. NZ J. Psychol.

Psychiatric disorder in a rural and an urban population. 1. Aetiology of depression

Psychol. Med.