American International Journal of Humanities and Social Science (AIJHSS)

The author examined the relationship between number of stressful life events, income status, and depressive symptoms in African American women. It was hypothesized that more stressful life events and low-income status would increase depressive symptoms in the women in the study. There were 103 participants whose ages ranged from 18 to 77 years old. The two levels of stressful life events were many or fewer. The two levels of income were impoverished or not impoverished. Income was further analyzed by dividing it into seven incremental income categories. Raw scores on the BDI-II were analyzed to determine if any, some, or all of the grouping variables were related to them. A 2 x 2 ANOVA revealed a main effect for stressors, p < .05, but no main effect for impoverishment status, p > .05. A 2 x 2 x 2 ANOVA revealed no main effect for stressors, p > .05, or impoverishment status, p > .05, or for incremental income in the lowest 2 categories, p > .05. A 2 x 7 ANOVA revealed a main effect for stressors, p < .05, but no main effect for incremental income categories 1-7, p > .05. No interaction effects were observed in any of the statistical analyses, p > .05. In 2002, the World Health Organization identified major depression as the leading cause of disability in the world. Approximately 19 million adult Americans will have at least one episode of depression each year (Tranter, O‟Donovan, Chandarana, & Kennedy, 2002). Depression can be debilitating for persons who are affected by it and for the families and acquaintances who are affected by it. The symptoms of depression include sadness, anhedonia (the inability to experience pleasure from activities usually found enjoyable), suicidality, psychomotor slowing, low self-esteem, guilt feelings, problems with energy needed to perform tasks, problems with concentration needed for cognitive involvement, problems with sleep, and problems with appetite (Zimmerman, McGlinchey, & Chelminski, 2006). A major depressive episode must include at least five of these symptoms (at least one of which must be sadness or anhedonia) most of the time for at least 2 weeks (APA, 2014). While the length of time varies for major depressive episodes, the symptoms must persist for at least 2-weeks to meet the minimum criteria. Some people experience depressive symptoms but do not have depression. The distinction between depression and depressive symptoms is not always easy to determine.