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Recorded Annual Meeting Presentations (RAMP) are now available for purchase.
Only $90 for presenters, $140 for registered attendees and $200 for non-attendees.

Online Program

326017
Psychological wellbeing in the face of adversity among American Indians: Preliminary Evidence of a New Health Paradox?


Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Melissa Walls, PhD, Biobehavioral Health and Population Sciences, University of Minnesota Medical School, Duluth campus, Duluth, MN
Cynthia Pearson, PhD, Indigenous Wellness Research Institute National Center of Excellence, University of Washington, Seattle, WA
Margarette Kading, PharmD, University of Minnesota, Duluth, MN
Ciwang Teyra, MSW, School of Social Work, University of Washington, Seattle, WA
Background & Purpose: Elevated health profiles among members of the lowest socioeconomic classes are paradoxical and intrigue public health researchers.  We provide preliminary evidence of a mental health paradox found in mutliple American Indian communities representing two distinct tribal cultures.

Methods: Data are from two independently designed cross-sectional community-based participatory research projects: the first study sample includes adult American Indians in the upper Midwest; the second is a sample of adult American Indian women in the Pacific Northwest. Community members served as research partners in study planning, design and implementation in both projects.

Findings: Results from survey data reveal very high reports of American Indian mental wellness/positive mental health occurring simultaneously with disproportionately high rates of anxiety, depressive symptoms, PTSD, and differential exposure to socio-historical stressors.

Implications: This paradoxical finding is robust in across two distinct study samples and may point to important nuances in Indigenous resilience and conceptions of health worthy of further investigation.

Learning Areas:

Diversity and culture
Social and behavioral sciences

Learning Objectives:
Describe the unique socio-cultural contexts of risk/protective factors influencing contemporary American Indian mental health. Evaluate new evidence of a potential mental paradox found in two American Indian communities. Discuss potential future directions for replicating and/or explaining the newly identified American Indian mental health paradox.

Keyword(s): Native Americans, Well-Being

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I am committed to collaborative research and have over a decade of experience working with tribal communities in the United States and Canada. My involvement in community-based participatory research (CBPR) projects to date includes mental health epidemiology; culturally relevant, family-based substance use prevention programming and evaluation; and examining the impact of stress and mental health on diabetes. Our work has received funding from the National Institutes of Health and the Public Health Agency of Canada.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

Back to: 5019.0: Poster #7 // Psychiatric Epidemiology