Poverty has significant effects on both mental and physical health. “The world’s most ruthless killer and the greatest cause of suffering on earth is extreme poverty.’’ (World Health Organization, Bridging the Gaps) Poverty and mental illness have a linkage to each other as one leads to another. My topic is poverty and mental illness. I chose this topic because I personally know how having the resources such as a steady income, healthcare insurance, housing, education can make a difference on people’s mental health while the lack of these recourses can lead to mental illness. I have two friends with different income level, both have mentally ill daughters. Over the years I observed my wealthy friend’s daughter’s mental health conditions improved.
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Poverty is not caused by the lack of resources in America. America is the wealthiest nation in the world, but Americans live shorter and sicker lives than almost all the other the industrialized nations. (Unnatural Causes in Sickness and in Wealth) The fact that we live in the wealthiest nation in the world yet so many people suffer from the mental illness due to poverty proves that poverty is caused by the unequal distribution of resources and opportunities within the American society.
One of the controversy among the sociologist is whether people become poor because they are mentally ill and therefore unable to function or they become mentally ill because of being poor. Thoits states that according to the stress theory, growth of social stressors can cause mental health problems. (Thoits, 2010) Poverty is the main source of stress. Thoits also suggest that “in order to eliminate mental health, one needs to eliminate or reduce stressors”. That also means the elimination of poverty because it is a chain of events that needs to be broken, one leads to the another. Poverty causes stress, stress causes mental illness and mental illness causes poverty. Also, to eliminate the stressor our policy makers should work on creating policies to reduce the …show more content…
Structural conditions such as economic difficulties can cause people to experience stressors and stressors lead to the mental illness. Thoits also includes Merton’s theory of Anomie within his article “Sociological Approaches to Mental Illness”. According to Merton’s theory our social and economic system cause higher rates of mental disorder for certain groups. The central point of his analyses is that mental illness is caused by the structural strain which means roads that would take a person to success and wealth is blocked and this blockage is due to the structure. Homeless people who are mentally ill can be an example for that because their chances to be healthy individuals limited by the structural
Poverty is not caused by the lack of resources in America. America is the wealthiest nation in the world, but Americans live shorter and sicker lives than almost all the other the industrialized nations. (Unnatural Causes in Sickness and in Wealth) The fact that we live in the wealthiest nation in the world yet so many people suffer from the mental illness due to poverty proves that poverty is caused by the unequal distribution of resources and opportunities within the American society.
One of the controversy among the sociologist is whether people become poor because they are mentally ill and therefore unable to function or they become mentally ill because of being poor. Thoits states that according to the stress theory, growth of social stressors can cause mental health problems. (Thoits, 2010) Poverty is the main source of stress. Thoits also suggest that “in order to eliminate mental health, one needs to eliminate or reduce stressors”. That also means the elimination of poverty because it is a chain of events that needs to be broken, one leads to the another. Poverty causes stress, stress causes mental illness and mental illness causes poverty. Also, to eliminate the stressor our policy makers should work on creating policies to reduce the …show more content…
Structural conditions such as economic difficulties can cause people to experience stressors and stressors lead to the mental illness. Thoits also includes Merton’s theory of Anomie within his article “Sociological Approaches to Mental Illness”. According to Merton’s theory our social and economic system cause higher rates of mental disorder for certain groups. The central point of his analyses is that mental illness is caused by the structural strain which means roads that would take a person to success and wealth is blocked and this blockage is due to the structure. Homeless people who are mentally ill can be an example for that because their chances to be healthy individuals limited by the structural