Introduction
In recent years policymakers, social workers, researchers, and healthcare professionals have dedicated more attention to the importance of mental well-being. One of the factors that may impact a person’s mental health is their financial well-being. Living in poverty is linked to some environmental factors, such as being exposed to violence more often than members of other communities and financial issues, for example, the inability to afford mental care. Policymakers should address the mental health of disadvantaged communities by teaching caregivers how to help the youth cope with difficulties.
Statement of Problem
Poverty subjects people to problems that adversely impact their mental health and hinder their ability to improve their financial and social status. Firstly, people who live in poor communities and nicothoids are more often exposed to violence, which may cause PTSD or trauma. Both instances are severe psychological conditions that can affect the way people behave. Additionally, an evident result of poverty is a lack of access to opportunities, including education, which may impact a person’s self-esteem. Most importantly, people who live in poverty do not have a chance to address their mental health problems because mental health care and therapy are usually not covered by insurance and have a high cost. Hence, poverty creates a cycle of traumatic events paired with the impaired financial ability to resolve mental health problems. People who live in poverty suffer from mental health problems more often because they are exposed to crimes, face intolerance from other communities, and cannot afford the price of mental care and associated costs.
Literature Review
The prevalence of mental health problems in disadvantaged communities is higher when compared to economically stable areas. According to the findings by Kodet et al. (2019), young people who live in poor neighborhoods have higher rates of mental health disorders when compared to youth who live in middle-income families. While poverty does not cause mental disorders directly, it hinders access to care options and subjects people to unfair treatment and bias from members of other communities.
Social workers have the power to make meaningful changes within these disadvantaged communities, but these professionals have to be mindful of how the political agenda and biases shape their perceptions of others (Castrellon, 2010). Castrellon (2010) argues that under Queer Theory and Narrative Theory, society plays an essential role in shaping the people’s perceptions of themselves. Hence, if the pollical agenda and the social work practices are intolerable to people who live in disadvantaged communities, their perception of themselves will be hindered. Children who live in poverty feel the effect of social stratification, and adults often report being rejected by members of other communities due to their financial status (Mowat, 2019; Roy et al., 2019).
Although children in these communities do not have the ability to access proper mental care, they can rely on their parents for help. Notably, both Mowat (2019) and Pederson et al. (2019) argue that the role of adults for youth living in poverty and the latter’s mental health is essential. Mowat (2019) argues that although children from lower-income families have impaired mental health when compared to other social groups, this effect is mediated by having a supportive adult. Pederson et al. (2019), on the other hand, offer caregiver education as a way of addressing limited access to mental health services. This approach implies teaching parents and other caregivers how to support their children and provide them with basic psychotherapeutic help to account for the lack of these services in their communities.
The costs associated with mental health treatments are unbearable for individuals living in poverty. Health insurance, in general, is a problem within disadvantaged communities, where people cannot get proper care unless it is funded by the government. Moreover, poor communities are often overburdened with problems such as crime and lack of education or social services support. Roy et al. (2019) argue that violence and exposure crimes are among the top ranking factors that have an adverse effect on disadvantaged youths. The amount and severity of problems in these communities are the potential reasons why only 3% of respondents recognize mental health as an important struggle (Roy et al., 2019). While some may argue that this data supports the conclusion that mental health and poverty are not linked, this shows that people living in these conditions are overburdened with a plethora of other problems. Other studies explored in this paper show that mental health illnesses are indeed prevalent within these communities, especially among youths.
The strengths of the collected data are the comparison between low-income and middle-income communities and families. For instance, Kodet et al. (2019) benchmarked youth from both populations to compare their perceptions of psychotherapy, access options, and barriers. The limitations of data include small sample sizes since none of the reviewed studies was a nationwide survey or a sizeable systematic study. Hence, many differences may be present in terms of outcomes, which is supported by the fact that some studies point to financial problems as the primary determinant of mental health, while others argue that these problems are underrecognized by the community members.
Anticipated criticism of the collected findings may concern the generalizability of results, or more specifically, whether the studies used samples that are representative of the population in question. Mainly, studies such as the one by Kodet et al. (2019) point to the inadequate quality of psychotherapy services that the disadvantaged youths receive, but the authors state that there is a limited amount of research that would focus on this community and the quality of services they receive. The lack of data is an issue and a critical point since there is little evidence to support the conclusion that youth in poverty does not have the same access and opportunities to care for their mental health. Additionally, the study by Mowat (2019) focuses specifically on the youth living in Scotland, which may be a controversial point because the social, political, and cultural environments in Scotland are different from those in the United States. However, both examples show that the issue of mental health is a serious concern for disadvantaged communities.
Despite the fact that the examined studies point to different issues within the link between poverty and mental health, there is a common acknowledgment that people in disadvantaged communities have fewer resources to address their mental health struggles. For example, merely considering the transportation costs, a basic factor, is problematic for this population (Kodet et al., 2019). Therefore, these people do not have the same opportunities to recognize and address their mental health disparities.
Findings
The studies reviewed in this paper help one be prepared for a future career because they inform about the potential challenges that people who live in poverty face. The understanding of this factor is essential for social work because it allows seeing that poverty is not merely a financial struggle for people since it also affects their mental health. One way to resolve this problem is through advocacy, policies, and government programs that support disadvantaged communities. A government-funded social problem that allows youth to access mental health care will address all issues examined in the paper. If this program is administered through online resources, such as video conference programs, the youth in disadvantaged communities will be able to access mental care free of charge and free of additional costs, such as transportation. Hence, this paper synthesized evidence that supports information obtained from other major courses, which is that disadvantaged communities are affected by some social and psychological problems disproportionately.
These studies also show the potential alternatives to the traditional way of addressing mental health problems, which is psychotherapy. Pederson et al. (2019), for example, offer to focus on teaching the caregivers, such as parents or other adults, the skills and techniques that will help them support their children and their mental well-being. This helps address the main variables of this study, which include the community members and intervention strategy. The latter has to be viable considering the proportion of the problem and the scale of government support needed to resolve it. There are thousands of disadvantaged communities within the country, and creating a program that would provide personalized mental care to each member of these communities is unrealistic. Thus, a more realistic intervention that focuses on ensuring that people living in poverty and their children are resilient to psychological problems is a better alternative.
Discussion
A major limitation to this solution is the government’s ability to allocate funds to help disadvantaged communities. Since the healthcare system in the United States is insurance-based, including mental care, the funding of this social domain relies on people’s ability to pay for the services. One way to address this social disparity is by focusing on teaching adults how to be resilient and support their children. In this way, the funding will be needed only for the public awareness campaign and for the education materials, while the parents will serve as a substitute for psychotherapy for their children. This approach, however, does not allow addressing serious mental health problems that can only be resolved with the help of a professional. Therefore, the issue of diagnosing and treating severe mental health disorders, such as depression, bipolar, or others, will remain. Moreover, as this paper reports, the problem of quality of care within these communities is pressing. These two issues can be addressed simultaneously through government-led interventions that assist people living in poverty who seek mental care.
Conclusion
In summary, this paper examines the link between poverty and mental health, the literature findings on the topic, and proposes a potential solution. Poverty affects children the most since they sense social stratification and rejection from the members of other communities. Moreover, these individuals face challenges such as the inability to pay for transportation or not being able to afford mental health services altogether. With that, one should note that children in these communities are exposed to more violence and crimes, which may prompt the development of trauma or even PTSD. One potential solution is training adults and caregivers to provide mental health support.
References
Castrellon, E. (2010). An exploration of the social construction of race and racial identity: A project-based upon an independent investigation. (Masters Thesis, Smith College, Northampton). Web.
Kodet, J., Reese, R. J., Duncan, B. L., & Bohanske, R. T. (2019). Psychotherapy for depressed youth in poverty: Benchmarking outcomes in a public behavioral health setting. Psychotherapy, 56(2), 254–259. Web.
Mowat, J. G. (2019). Exploring the impact of social inequality and poverty on the mental health and wellbeing and attainment of children and young people in Scotland. Improving Schools, 22(3), 204–223.
Pedersen, G.A., Smallegange, E., Coetzee, A., Hartog, K., Turner, J., Jordans, M. D. & Brown, F. L. (2019). A systematic review of the evidence for family and parenting interventions in low- and middle-income countries: Child and youth mental health outcomes. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 28, 2036–2055.
Roy, A. L., Raver, C. C., Masucci, M. D., & DeJoseph, M. (2019). “If they focus on giving us a chance in life we can actually do something in this world”: Poverty, inequality, and youths’ critical consciousness. Developmental Psychology, 55(3), 550–561. Web.