African American Suicide

This paper is in reference to eating disorders in African American women, and how they differ to those of other minority groups. Through research, it was found that eating disorders are not as known in African American women, or women of minority due to cultural differences. Different studies were analyzed of African American women at different colleges, to verify that eating disorders were prevalent in the sample groups. It was concluded in several studies that obesity rates, racial identity, and body image were the determining factors of the eating disorders.

Post-traumatic stress disorder is a well known disorder that takes over the life of it’s victim. We know that anyone has the chance of facing this challenging disorder but does race/ culture have anything to do with it? Throughout this paper we will be trying to answer this question and many more. This paper’s main focus is on what post-traumatic stress disorder is, what evidence provided by researchers leads us to believe that race and ethnicity has something to do with PTSD rates and last but not least the few ways on how to treat PTSD patients properly.

13.2% of the United States population identifies themselves as Black as African Americans, and of those over 16% had an mental illness that was diagnosable. The socio economic impact of a history of slavery, sharecropping and race-based exclusion from health, racism, spiritual beliefs, social and economic resources, education and other factors are key factors that contribute to African American disparities today. Many of these things are linked to mental health. According to the US department of health, African Americans are 20% more likely to report having serious psychological distress than in non-Hispanic whites (. Despite knowing this, African Americans are less likely to seek mental health services than white Americans.

According to research, California State Fullerton professor Eliza Noh states that Asian-American women of the age 15 to 24 have the highest rates of suicide than any other racial, ethnic, or gender group. The “model minority” pressure—“socially produced pressure internalized by families of some Asian-American children to be high achievers at school and professionally”—plays a large factor to the issue, especially since girls, who are more affected by it than boys, are expected to become the “perfect mother, daughter, wife and get only A’s in school and choose the right type of job,” (Cruz 1). Noh adds on, saying that Asian-American women have a tendency “to ignore or deny stress, depression and other mental health problems” which “can

According to further findings of the research, “In 2007, suicide was the third-leading cause of death among fifteen to twenty-four-year-old Black Americans.” When compared to their white peers they were also found to be more liable to attempt suicide. Sometimes stress can be unavoidable in our everyday lives; however, everyone’s coping method is different. Therefore, assisting someone in understanding the cause of the problem and learning how to cope is a very vital and effective way to prevent or reduce the number of individuals from taking their own lives. Wang and his colleagues (N(Wang, Nyutu, & Tran, 2012) also stated that, “Coping has played a mediator role between antecedent stressful event and psychological distress such as anxiety,

Suicide has become a major issue amongst African-American adolescent males. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS), suicide is the third leading cause of death for Black boys age 13 to 17 (CDC, 2014). That is above the number of deaths due to chronic diseases such as cancer, HIV and diabetes (CDC, WISQARS 2016.). Additionally, CDC reports for 2014 there were 68 African-American adolescent males that completed suicide and 1131 reported attempts for that year (CDC, WISQARS 2016). This is a significant number, although not all suicide attempts are reported (Joiner, 2005). Furthermore, suicide accounted for 10 percent of deaths of adolescents in 2014 reports (CDC, WISQARS 2016).

The purpose of the current study was to examine “whether racial discrimination and any of the coping strategies were related to depressive symptoms” (Seaton, et al., 2014, p. 885) in Black American youth. The authors mention that there have been studies which indicate “perceptions of racial discrimination have been linked to lower life satisfaction levels, decreased

Women who feel shame about eating are also less likely to seek help for their eating disorders, and this shame has been found to be more prevalent in women from non-Western ethnicities living in the Western world. Women from different ethnicities experience guilt and a fear of losing control while eating at different levels. Asian and Native American women are the most likely to feel embarrassed about overeating or losing control while eating (Eating Disorders Review, 2007, 5). They are therefore the least likely to seek help for their binge-eating disorders. Healthcare providers should take ethnicity into account when determining causal factors of binge-eating in women from Asian and Native American cultures because they are more

In a study conducted by the Minnesota Department of Health (2003), researchers addressed mental health disparities between communities of color and the White community in several areas of health and well-being. Results indicated that although the amount of Asian Americans and African Americans students living in Greater Minnesota is relatively small, they reported much higher levels of several key risk behaviors than do their counterpart. More specifically, African Americans tend to score twice as worse as their White counterparts in most areas (sexual activity, fighting, emotional distress, smoking, drinking, family ties, activities, and etc.).

The relationship between ethnicity and eating disorder risk factors is a complex issue. There are many other variables that affect these two ideas, such as socioeconomic status, level of educational attainment, and acculturation. Flaws in studies such as unrepresentative and insubstantial sample size, and participation bias still have yet to be corrected for in order to obtain a more accurate understanding of the role ethnicity and its factors plays in eating disorders. Previous studies have suggested that the difference in eating disorder symptoms across ethnicities were negligible; however, the risk factors, such as the

Africans who could no longer take the harsh treatment would take their own lives. These suicide attempts transpired daily, the Africans would take their lives in most painfully and unpleasant ways. The Africans would jump overboard when they were allowed on above deck. They would even plead with others to smother them. Another way was to avoid eating. Famine suicides were becoming a trend onboard the ships, the Europeans would keep a special chisel to force feed the Africans who refused to eat. The Africans resorted to killing themselves as they believed that they would be taken back to their homeland and reunite with their families. The Europeans would then try to stop them from killing themselves by hacking off their heads, suggesting that

Eating disorders seem to have become more common during the latter half of the 20th century, during a period of American beauty icons becoming thinner and women’s magazines publishing more articles on methods for weight loss (Garner, Garfinkel, Schwartz, & Thompson, 1980). Dissatisfaction with one’s own body a result of the increasingly thin depictions of female body shapes in the mass media has been mainly attributed to the Caucasian young female population (Striegel-Moore, Silberstein, & Rodin, 1986). To date, there has been relatively little empirical research investigating the prevalence, etiology, and treatment of eating disorders in ethnic minorities. Additionally, studies investigating the direct link between acculturation of Asian American individuals in Western societies and eating disorder symptomology have failed to find a consistent correlation. Intuitively, researchers have suggested a positive relationship between acculturation, the adoption of characteristics, beliefs, ideals and values of the host culture (Gowen, Hayward, Killen, Robinson, & Taylor, 1999), and disordered eating symptomology in Asian Americans but the studies have yielded mixed findings. Therefore, there appear to be other factors influencing the development of eating disorder symptomology in Asian Americans, including self-esteem and the drive for thinness.

The sociocultural model of eating pathology posits that minority ethnic status confers a protective benefit against societal messages that promote the Western thin ideal (Shaw, Ramirez, Trost, Randall, & Stice, 2004). As such, ethnic minorities should demonstrate more body satisfaction and fewer eating disturbances. While previous research has supported this notion, newer studies suggest that ethnic differences in body dissatisfaction may not be as prominent as previously estimated (Grabe & Hyde, 2006; Roberts, Cash, Feingold, & Johnson, 2006). In fact, a number of relevant but often unexplored variables such as biased publication of only significant findings, age of sample, homogenous clumping of all ethnic minorities into a non-white category,

One would be on their rating of collectivism that they experience. This would likely result in lower reported levels of collectivism among Caucasians in comparison to African-Americans. That data would show that Caucasians share fewer common beliefs and are less integrated social with their fellow man, than that of their African-American counterparts. Additionally, studies could be done to analyze the type of religions followed by each group, and compare them to the suicide rates. A statistical analysis regarding the religions followed by both races would likely show that Caucasians are more likely to not participate in any religious following. This would be an indication of a lack of the social integration that religious groups can bring to an individual. Statistics could also be used to show this relationship by associating the lower suicide rate of African-Americans with lower income. Finally, regarding the age group of 20-29 year-old males, the difference could be observed statistically by surveying males on their connection to family and religion in all age groups in both racial categories, then analyzing the data between age groups to see if there is a drop in social connections in 20-29 year-old African-American men. This drop could then be associated to the increased suicide rate. Again, not only is a lower level of social integration possible, but also a lower level of

Historically, eating disorders have been associated with upper-class, Caucasian women but as the global phenomenon of “westernization” has spread, so has the idea of body ideals. Kathleen M. Pike, the executive director of the Global Mental Health Program and supervising psychologist in the Eating Disorder Program at NYSPI, recently came up with the theory that an increase in