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Discrimination, Mental Disorders, and Suicidal Ideation in Latino Adults: Decomposing the Effects of Discrimination

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Abstract

Experiences of discrimination and mental disorder have been recognized as risks for suicidality. Yet, few studies have examined the direct and indirect effects of discrimination on suicidal ideation through mental disorder among Latino adults in the U.S. This study aimed to examine whether everyday discrimination and racial/ethnic discrimination is associated with suicidal ideation and if mental disorder (i.e., DSM-IV depressive, anxiety, and substance use) mediates the association. Discrimination was operationalized with self-reported discriminatory experience. This study applied a mediation analysis to the data from National Latino and Asian American Survey, 2002–2003. The key findings are: (a) everyday discrimination had an independent association with suicidal ideation as well as exerted an indirect effect through anxiety disorder. (b) Racial/ethnic discrimination was not directly associated with suicidal ideation, but its adverse effect on suicidal ideation was mediated by the depressive disorder. (c) Three types of mental disorder together accounted for approximately 32 and 42% of the impact of everyday discrimination and racial/ethnic discrimination on suicidal ideation, respectively.

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Funding

The National Latino and Asian American Study is supported by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH; Grant U01 MH062209 for M. Alegria, PI, and U01 MH 62207 for D. Takeuchi, PI) with supplemental support from the Office of Behavior and Social Science Research, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Agency, and The Latino Research Program Project P01 MH059876 The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Mental Health.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology and Sociology, Texas A & M University, Kingsville, 700 University Blvd, MSC 177, Kingsville, TX, 78363, USA

    Soyoung Kwon & Daehoon Han

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  1. Soyoung Kwon
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  2. Daehoon Han
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Correspondence to Soyoung Kwon.

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All authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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This article does not contain any studies with human participants performed by any of the authors.

Appendix

Appendix

See Table 4 and Fig. 1.

Table 4 Sample characteristics, National Latino and Asian American Survey (n = 1916)
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Fig. 1
figure 1

Predicted probability of suicidal ideation as a function of self-reported everyday discrimination. Predicted probabilities are generated based on Model 4 in Table 2

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Kwon, S., Han, D. Discrimination, Mental Disorders, and Suicidal Ideation in Latino Adults: Decomposing the Effects of Discrimination. J Immigrant Minority Health 21, 143–150 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10903-018-0726-5

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