Topic: Unemployment, Wellness
Publication: Journal of Vocational Behavior
Article: Unemployment impairs mental health: Meta-analyses.
Author: K.I. Paul, K. Moser
Featured by: Benjamin Granger
Does unemployment CAUSE poor mental
health? After all, isn’t it
possible that poor mental health can cause unemployment? Seriously, what employer wants to hire
a distressed, anxious, depressed employee with low self-esteem?
In an attempt to arrive at a firm
conclusion about whether unemployment actually causes changes in mental health,
Paul and Moser (2009) report on the results of two meta-analyses that included
237 cross-sectional studies as well as 87 longitudinal studies. In addition to
their primary goal of uncovering the causal link between unemployment and
mental health, the researchers also investigated a number of factors that might
affect unemployment’s role in predicting mental health.
Overall, Paul and Moser’s results suggest
that unemployement does indeed have a negative influence on mental health
outcomes (e.g., symptoms of distress, anxiety, depression, self-esteem). If this seems obvious, Paul and Moser
also uncovered several factors that make some individuals more prone to poor
mental health during unemployment.
For example, the negative effects of unemployment were greater for men
than for women, greater for blue collar workers than white collar workers, and
greater for the long-term unemployed than the short-term unemployed.
