SynthesisPsychological medicine2018
Ethnic density effects for adult mental health: systematic review and meta-analysis of international studies.
Synthesis in Psychological medicine, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 59 papers, 6 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
59 citing papers in PubMed, 6 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- A systematic review of co-ethnic exposure and cardiometabolic outcomes in racial and ethnic minoritized populations.Public health reviews · 2026Pooled it
- Specificity of environmental risk factors for schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, and depressive disorders - umbrella review.Psychological medicine · 2025Pooled it
- Social Determinants of Health and Suicide-Related Outcomes: A Review of Meta-Analyses.JAMA psychiatry · 2025Pooled it
- Fatigue Symptoms Associated With COVID-19 in Convalescent or Recovered COVID-19 Patients; a Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Annals of behavioral medicine : a publication of the Society of Behavioral Medicine · 2022Pooled it
- The ethnic density effect in psychosis: a systematic review and multilevel meta-analysis.The British journal of psychiatry : the journal of mental science · 2021Pooled it
- Migration and schizophrenia: meta-analysis and explanatory framework.European archives of psychiatry and clinical neuroscience · 2020Pooled it
- Mental health and legal statuses along the path to citizenship: A qualitative study of minority ethnic urban dwellers in Chiang Mai, Thailand.Global health research and policy · 2026Article
- Neighborhood Deprivation and Adolescent Mental Health: The Protective Role of School Staffing Patterns.Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry · 2026Article
- Associations of racialized economic segregation with the prevalence of unhealthy behaviors and poor mental health in the United States.Preventive medicine reports · 2026Article
- Racial/ethnic variation of neighborhood social cohesion, loneliness, and cognitive functioning among midlife and older U.S. adults.The journals of gerontology. Series B, Psychological sciences and social sciences · 2026Article
- "This Is Not My Food": Exploring Experiences Among Patients With a Migration Background in Specialist Eating Disorder Treatment in Sweden.The International journal of eating disorders · 2026Article
- Demographic variation in symptoms of depression and anxiety across 22 Global Flourishing Study countries.Communications medicine · 2026Article
- Trends in recorded deaths involving antipsychotics: The role of deprivation, ethnicity, and regional disparities.PloS one · 2026Article
- School Ethnic Density and Mental Health Problems in Black, Latine, and White Preadolescent Children.Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry · 2025Article
- Neighbourhood belonging, social cohesion, and mental wellbeing of children and parents in an ethnically diverse community sample in England.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Urban mental health: a position paper of the European psychiatric association.European psychiatry : the journal of the Association of European Psychiatrists · 2025Review
- Divergence in the size and composition of the race gap in mental health: Evidence from South Africa.SSM - population health · 2025Article
- Establishing a glycolysis-linked multigene prognostic signature in lung adenocarcinoma: a multicenter integrative approach.Journal of thoracic disease · 2025Article
- Ethnic Density and Mental Health: Does it Matter Whether the Ethnic Density is Co-ethnic or Multi-ethnic and How Important is Change in Ethnic Density?Journal of racial and ethnic health disparities · 2025Article
- A matter of measurement? A Swedish register-based study of migrant residential segregation and all-cause mortality.SSM - population health · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundDespite increased ethnic diversity in more economically developed countries it is unclear whether residential concentration of ethnic minority people (ethnic density) is detrimental or protective for mental health. This is the first systematic review and meta-analysis covering the international literature, assessing ethnic density associations with mental health outcomes.
methodsWe systematically searched Medline, PsychINFO, Sociological Abstracts, Web of Science from inception to 31 March 2016. We obtained additional data from study authors. We conducted random-effects meta-analysis taking into account clustering of estimates within datasets. Meta-regression assessed heterogeneity in studies due to ethnicity, country, generation, and area-level deprivation. Our main exposure was ethnic density, defined as the residential concentration of own racial/ethnic minority group. Outcomes included depression, anxiety and the common mental disorders (CMD), suicide, suicidality, psychotic experiences, and psychosis.
resultsWe included 41 studies in the review, with meta-analysis of 12 studies. In the meta-analyses, we found a large reduction in relative odds of psychotic experiences [odds ratio (OR) 0.82 (95% confidence interval (CI) 0.76-0.89)] and suicidal ideation [OR 0.88 (95% CI 0.79-0.98)] for each 10 percentage-point increase in own ethnic density. For CMD, depression, and anxiety, associations were indicative of protective effects of own ethnic density; however, results were not statistically significant. Findings from narrative review were consistent with those of the meta-analysis.
conclusionsThe findings support consistent protective ethnic density associations across countries and racial/ethnic minority populations as well as mental health outcomes. This may suggest the importance of the social environment in patterning detrimental mental health outcomes in marginalized and excluded population groups.
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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.