ArticleJournal of epidemiology and community health2006
Income inequality and physical and mental health: testing associations consistent with proposed causal pathways.
Article in Journal of epidemiology and community health, 2006. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 27 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
27 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 92 citations in OpenAlex.
- Causal Assessment of Income Inequality on Self-Rated Health and All-Cause Mortality: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.The Milbank quarterly · 2024Pooled it
- A systematic review and meta-analysis of the relationship between economic inequality and prosocial behaviour.Nature human behaviour · 2023Pooled it
- The association between income inequality and adult mental health at the subnational level-a systematic review.Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology · 2022Pooled it
- Relative Poverty and Mental Illness in Adults, Children, and Adolescents in Industrialized Countries.Deutsches Arzteblatt international · 2025Review
- The impact of household wealth gap on individual's mental health.BMC public health · 2023Article
- Factors related to adverse long-term outcomes after mild traumatic brain injury in children: a scoping review.Archives of disease in childhood · 2023Article
- Mental Health, Material Possessions, and Social Capital During COVID-19: A Study of the United States Urban Working-Age Population.Applied research in quality of life · 2023Article
- Exploring the relationship between mental health and dialect use among Chinese older adults: a moderated mediation estimation.Frontiers in psychology · 2023Article
- Rising childhood income inequality and declining Americans' health.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2022Article
- Socio-economic inequalities in social network, loneliness and mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic.The International journal of social psychiatry · 2022Article
- Comprehensive metrological and content analysis of the income inequality research in health field: A bibliometric analysis.Frontiers in public health · 2022Article
- Household Income, Pandemic-Related Income Loss, and the Probability of Anxiety and Depression.Eastern economic journal · 2021Article
- Income inequality and racial disparities in pregnancy-related mortality in the US.SSM - population health · 2019Article
- Income inequality and depression: a systematic review and meta-analysis of the association and a scoping review of mechanisms.World psychiatry : official journal of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA) · 2018Article
- Impact of co-located welfare advice in healthcare settings: prospective quasi-experimental controlled study.The British journal of psychiatry : the journal of mental science · 2017Article
- Neighbourhood socioeconomic deprivation and health-related quality of life: A multilevel analysis.PloS one · 2017Article
- Income inequality and depressive symptoms in South Africa: A longitudinal analysis of the National Income Dynamics Study.Health & place · 2016Article
- Income inequality within urban settings and depressive symptoms among adolescents.Journal of epidemiology and community health · 2016Article
- Material deprivation and health: a longitudinal study.BMC public health · 2016Article
- Exploring risk factors in Latino cardiovascular disease: the role of education, nativity, and gender.American journal of public health · 2014Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
2 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesTo test associations between individual health outcomes and ecological variables proposed in causal models of relations between income inequality and health.
designRegression analysis of a large, nationally representative dataset, linked to US census and other county and state level sources of data on ecological covariates. The regressions control for individual economic and demographic covariates as well as relevant potential ecological confounders.
settingThe US population in the year 2000.
participants4817 US adults about age 40, representative of the US population.
main outcome measuresTwo outcomes were studied: self reported general health status, dichotomised as "fair" or "poor" compared with "excellent", "very good", or "good", and depression as measured by a score on the Center for Epidemiologic Studies depression instrument >16.
resultsState generosity was significantly associated with a reduced odds of reporting poor general health (OR 0.84, 95%CI: 0.71 to 0.99), and the county unemployment rate with reduced odds of reporting depression (OR 0.91, 95%CI: 0.84 to 0.97). The measure of income inequality is a significant risk factor for reporting poor general health (OR 1.98, CI: 1.08 to 3.62), controlling for all ecological and individual covariates. In stratified models, the index of social capital is associated with reduced odds of reporting poor general health among black people and Hispanics (OR 0.40, CI: 0.18 to 0.90), but not significant among white people. The inequality measure is significantly associated with reporting poor general health among white people (OR 2.60, CI: 1.22 to 5.56) but not black people and Hispanics.
conclusionsThe effect of income inequality on health may work through the influence of invidious social comparisons (particularly among white subjects) and (among black subjects and Latinos) through a reduction in social capital. Researchers may find it fruitful to recognise the cultural specificity of any such effects.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.