An analysis of 2022 Joint Election Survey data found that mental health is emerging as a source of political identity, especially among younger and more liberal Americans (Gen Z). These people believe that people with mental illness should work together to change laws that are unfair to them, and they tend to support increased spending on health care, education, and welfare. This study political action.
Recent years have seen several U.S. politicians publicly acknowledge that they are grappling with mental health issues. For example, in 2022, Democrat John Fetterman won Pennsylvania’s Senate seat. Two months later, he was admitted to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center for inpatient treatment for the clinical depression he had suffered from for years.
“I never thought it would be so important to go get help,” Fetterman said. “And of course I regret not doing that.” After treatment, he returned to work, but questions about his physical and mental health remained.
Although Fetterman did not initially make his mental health a central part of his political identity, other U.S. senators have done so. For example, Sen. Tina Smith is a prominent advocate for mental health and has sponsored multiple mental health bills during her time in the U.S. Senate.
In a speech on the Senate floor, she said that mental health is one of her top priorities, and one of the reasons for that is that she also suffers from depression. She described her condition with the phrase “I’m one of them,” referring to people with mental illness, suggesting that having a mental illness can be the basis of a political identity.
Study author Lauren van de Hei posed the following question: If political elites are beginning to think about their mental health in terms of political identity, are citizens also thinking about their mental health in terms of political identity? With this in mind, she conducted research exploring the extent to which people with mental illness treat mental illness as a source of political identity, and investigated the political predictors and consequences of such identities, as well as the political participation of these people.
He noted that previous research has shown that liberals (Democrats) are more likely than conservatives (Republicans) to report poorer mental health, but that Republicans are less likely to seek treatment. Past research has also shown that Democrats are more likely than Republicans to consider anxiety and depression to be mental health conditions, which may suppress self-reporting among conservatives.
She analyzed data from the 2022 Cooperative Election Survey (CES), a large-scale national survey managed by YouGov. The survey consisted of common content questions asked to everyone and questions from the university team that were given to only a portion of the 1,000 respondents. In election years, waves of CES occur around the election.
The authors of this study created a series of mental health identity assessments included in the post-election wave of this study, which were administered to a group of 860 respondents in November 2022.
This battery included an assessment of mental health political identity developed by the authors (by adapting a previously existing measure of White identity). “The first question asked respondents whether they had ever suffered from a mental illness, disability, or serious chronic physical illness.
This classification of questions caused the questions to diverge. “Respondents who classified themselves as having a mental illness were given a complete mental health identity question consisting of two questions about identity, two questions about group consciousness, and two questions about feelings of alienation,” the study authors explained in their paper.
Results showed that 26% of participants reported having suffered from a mental illness in their lifetime. Meanwhile, 22% said they had a physical disability and 20% said they had a severe chronic physical illness. About half of study participants with a mental illness said that their identity as a person with a mental illness was very important or somewhat important to them. These rates were slightly lower for individuals with physical disabilities or chronic illnesses.
Self-reported mental illness was more common among liberals than among conservatives. Among very liberal participants, 39% declared they had suffered from a mental illness in their lifetime. Among very conservative participants, this proportion was only 16%. People with a strong mental illness identity were less likely to be conservative and more likely to be liberal. This identity was also more pronounced among younger generations of Americans (Gen Z).
Further analysis revealed that those who self-classified as suffering from mental illness and who scored high on mental health identity were just as likely to participate in politics as those who did not self-classify. This is noteworthy because having a physical disability typically reduces turnout and political participation. Additionally, individuals who self-classify as having a mental illness and have a strong mental health identity are more likely to support significant increases in health, education, and welfare spending.
“We found that people who have experienced mental illness feel an affinity for others who have experienced mental illness, are also more likely to self-classify as having or have had mental illness, share a sense of collective consciousness with others who have or have had mental illness, and recognize the need to work together to change laws that are unfair to people with mental illness,” the study authors concluded. “These findings have far-reaching implications for mental health advocacy and the role mental health identities play in the political arena, especially as Gen Z matures as a group.”
This study contributes to the scientific understanding of political identity in the United States. However, it should be noted that the purpose of this study is primarily descriptive. The cross-sectional design of the study does not allow causal inferences to be drawn from the results. The study’s authors also note that social desirability bias may have influenced the results, as more liberal people may be more willing to recognize and report mental health problems rather than denying them.
This paper, “Just a Little Melancholy, Maybe a Little Blue: Mental Health as a New Political Identity,” was written by Lauren van de Hei.
