THE BAD MENTAL HABITS

When people are under chronic stress tend to smoke, drink, use drugs or overeating to cope with stress. These behaviors activate a cascade of biological events that helps prevent depression but also contribute to a number of physical problems that eventually lead to an early death.
This is what we affirm the social scientist at the University of Michigan, James, S. Jackson and colleagues in an article published in the May 2010 issue of American Journal of Public Health. The theory helps explain a long-standing epidemiological paradox: why blacks have poorer physical health than whites but better psychiatric health?
"People engage in bad habits for functional reasons, not character weakness or ignorance," said Jackson, director of the Institute for Social Research (ISR for its acronym in English) of the University of Michigan.
"In the course of life the strategies to deal with reality and the problems that are effective in the 'preservation' of the mental health of blacks can operate in concert with social, economic and environmental factors that produce disparities in physical health in middle age and later in life, "he added.
In an analysis of survey data obtained from the same people in two different moments in time, Jackson and his colleagues found evidence of his theory. The relationship between stressful life events and depression varies with the level of adverse health behaviors. But the direction of that relationship is strikingly different for blacks and whites.
To the extent that control the extent of stressful life events that a person has experienced harmful behaviors appeared to protect blacks against depression but the white lead to higher levels of depression.
"Many black Americans are chronically insecure and difficult environments," said Jackson. "These environments produce stressful living conditions and often more readily available options for dealing with stress are more harmful behavior. These behaviors can relieve stress by the same mechanisms that are thought to contribute to certain mental disorders: the axis of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) and related biological systems. "
Since the negative health behaviors such as smoking, alcohol drinking, drug use and overeating (especially foods rewarding) also have direct and debilitating effects on physical health, these behaviors, along with conditions hardship that give reason to these behaviors, contribute to inequalities in mortality and physical health problems among black and white.
These disparities in physical health and mortality are higher in middle age and more advanced, said Jackson.