Do Religious Struggles Mediate the Association between Day-to-Day Discrimination and Depressive Symptoms?
Journal Title: Religions - Year 2017, Vol 8, Issue 8
Abstract
Although numerous studies have shown that discrimination contributes to poorer mental health, the precise mechanisms underlying this association are not well understood. In this paper, we consider the possibility that the association between day-to-day discrimination (being disrespected, insulted, and harassed) and depressive symptoms is partially mediated by religious struggles (religious doubts and negative religious coping). To test our mediation model, we use data collected from the 2011 Miami-Dade Health Survey (n = 444) to estimate a series of multiple regression models assessing associations among day-to-day discrimination, religious struggles, and depressive symptoms. We find that day-to-day discrimination is positively associated with religious struggles and depressive symptoms, net of adjustments for general religious involvement, age, gender, race, ethnicity, immigrant status, interview language, education, employment, household income, financial strain, and marital status. We also observe that religious struggles are positively associated with depressive symptoms. Our mediation analyses confirm that day-to-day discrimination can contribute to depressive symptoms by stirring religious struggles. Our key finding is that religious struggles may serve as a maladaptive coping response to discrimination. Our analyses extend previous work by bridging research in the areas of discrimination, religious struggles, and mental health.
Authors and Affiliations
Terrence D. Hill, C. André Christie-Mizell, Preeti Vaghela, Krysia N. Mossakowski and Robert J. Johnson
Keywords
Related Articles
- EP ID EP25729
- DOI https://doi.org/10.3390/rel8080134
- Views 288
- Downloads 8
The Enlightened Self: Identity and Aspiration in Two Communities of Practice
Existing research on religious identity, especially from a narrative perspective, has tended to focus either on accounts of the past (especially occasions of religious change) or on conceptions of religious identity in...
Crashing, Chaos, Culture and Connection
This essay considers the experience of a seasoned disaster responder who encountered a personal disaster while traveling in Thailand. The resulting injury and helplessness led to new insights about mortality, vulnerabi...
Selecting the Best Version of SHALOM to Assess Spiritual Well-Being
This paper extends the reporting of contemporary use of the Spiritual Health and Life-Orientation Measure (SHALOM), which provides flexibility to researchers, enabling them to choose the version of the instrument that...
Paganism and Reform in Shakespeare’s Plays
Shakespeare’s plays mix references to pagan and Christian symbols and ideas in ways which are only superficially contradictory. While the sometimes uneasy juxtaposition of classical and Christian religious thought is c...
Imagery and Religious Conversion. The Symbolic Function of Jonah 1:13
Jonah 1:13 has a delaying function in the narrative, introducing a pause between Jonah’s demand to be thrown in the sea (1:12) and the event’s occurrence (1:15). Most commentators discuss only the events of 1:13 and th...