scholarly journals Country- and individual-level socioeconomic determinants of depression: multilevel cross-national comparison

2013 ◽  
Vol 202 (3) ◽  
pp. 195-203 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dheeraj Rai ◽  
Pedro Zitko ◽  
Kelvyn Jones ◽  
John Lynch ◽  
Ricardo Araya
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Income Inequality ◽  
Contextual Factors ◽  
National Income ◽  
Gross National Income ◽  
World Health ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Depression Prevalence ◽  
Country Level ◽  
Cross National

BackgroundThe prevalence and correlates of depression vary across countries. Contextual factors such as country-level income or income inequalities have been hypothesised to contribute to these differences.AimsTo investigate associations of depression with socioeconomic factors at the country level (income inequality, gross national income) and individual (education, employment, assets and spending) level, and to investigate their relative contribution in explaining the cross-national variation in the prevalence of depression.MethodMultilevel study using interview data of 187 496 individuals from 53 countries participating in the World Health Organization World Health Surveys.ResultsDepression prevalence varied between 0.4 and 15.7% across countries. Individual-level factors were responsible for 86.5% of this variance but there was also reasonable variation at the country level (13.5%), which appeared to increase with decreasing economic development of countries. Gross national income or country-level income inequality had no association with depression. At the individual level, fewer material assets, lower education, female gender, economic inactivity and being divorced or widowed were associated with increased odds of depression. Greater household spending, unlike material assets, was associated with increasing odds of depression (adjusted analysis).ConclusionsThe variance of depression prevalence attributable to country-level factors seemed to increase with decreasing economic development of countries. However, country-level income inequality or gross national income explained little of this variation, and individual-level factors appeared more important than contextual factors as determinants of depression. The divergent relationship of assets and spending with depression emphasise that different socioeconomic measures are not interchangeable in their associations with depression.

The Polarising Worlds of Welfare: Political Orientations, Macroeconomic Context, and Support for Redistribution

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-24
Author(s):  
RAJA NOUREDDINE ◽  
TIMOTHY B. GRAVELLE
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Income Inequality ◽  
Public Support ◽  
Sociodemographic Factors ◽  
Political Orientation ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Country Level ◽  
Preferences For Redistribution ◽  
Political Orientations

Abstract Public support for the welfare state – and the policies constituting it – has long been a topic of research. Previous research on support for redistribution has tended to focus on how either country-level characteristics (particularly those relating to the macro-economy such as levels of economic development or income inequality) or individual-level political factors (such as left-right political orientation and sociodemographic factors) shape support for redistribution. To date, empirical research has insufficiently tested how macroeconomic context and individual political orientations interact. Research has also obscured whether the effects of macroeconomic context hold cross-sectionally (across country contexts) or longitudinally (within countries over time). Drawing on data from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP), this article examines the cross-sectional (between-country) and longitudinal (within-country) interactive relationships involving economic development and income inequality (on one hand) and left–right political orientations (on the other) in shaping preferences for redistribution. Results indicate that there are larger left–right cleavages in attitudes in wealthier countries, more unequal countries, and countries where inequality is increasing. These findings challenge the dominant practice of focusing exclusively on additive effects of individual-level or country-level factors by showing the importance of paying attention to cross-level interactions.

Environmental Behavior in Cross-National Perspective

2016 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ignacio Pisano ◽  
Mark Lubell
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Behavior ◽  
National Level ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Education Development ◽  
Proenvironmental Behavior ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Country Level ◽  
National Differences ◽  
Cultural Research ◽  
Cross National

This article seeks to explain cross-national differences on environmental behavior. After controlling for a series of sociodemographic and psychosocial factors, it was predicted that national levels of wealth, postmaterialism, education development, and environmental problems are positively related to environmental behavior. The national-level variance is to a substantial degree explained by individual-level variables, capturing compositional effects. The remaining variance is explained by the contextual-level variables. All of the country-level variables are predictors in the expected direction, with the exception of environmental degradation, which is negatively related to behavior, and education development, which has no impact on private environmental behavior. More importantly, cross-level interactions show that in more developed countries, there are stronger relationships between proecological attitudes and reported proenvironmental behavior. These findings contribute to the growing cross-cultural research on environmental behavior pointing out the necessity of simultaneously assessing the effects of both individual and contextual-level forces affecting behavior across nations.

scholarly journals Income Inequality and Population Health: A Global Gradient?

2018 ◽  
Vol 59 (4) ◽  
pp. 536-553 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michaela Curran ◽  
Matthew C. Mahutga
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Income Inequality ◽  
Population Health ◽  
Fixed Effects ◽  
Harmful Effect ◽  
Fixed Effects Models ◽  
Two Measures ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Lower Population ◽  
Cross National

Cross-national empirical research about the link between income inequality and population health produces conflicting conclusions. We address these mixed findings by examining the degree to which the income inequality and health relationship varies with economic development. We estimate fixed-effects models with different measures of income inequality and population health. Results suggest that development moderates the association between inequality and two measures of population health. Our findings produce two generalizations. First, we observe a global gradient in the relationship between income inequality and population health. Second, our results are consistent with income inequality as a proximate or conditional cause of lower population health. Income inequality has a 139.7% to 374.3% more harmful effect on health in poorer than richer countries and a significantly harmful effect in 2.1% to 53.3% of countries in our sample and 6.6% to 67.6% of the world’s population but no significantly harmful effect in richer countries.

scholarly journals Appraising Cross-National Income Inequality Databases: An Introduction

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francisco H. G. Ferreira ◽  
Nora Lustig ◽  
Daniel Teles
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
National Income ◽  
Cross National

A Multilevel Approach to Investigating Cross-National Differences in Negotiation Processes

2004 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 471-484 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Evert Van de Vliert
Keyword(s):  
Research Approach ◽  
Psychological States ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Country Level ◽  
National Differences ◽  
The Social ◽  
Multilevel Research ◽  
Negotiation Processes ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Cross National

AbstractThe impact of the psychological states of the negotiators, the social conditions of negotiations, and the behavior of negotiators on the outcomes of negotiations differs from country to country. Various suboptimal, individual-level, and country-level solutions have been suggested to predict and explain such cross-national variations. Drawing inspiration from a series of cross-cultural studies on job satisfaction and motives for volunteer work that successfully employed multilevel modeling, we propose a multilevel research approach to more accurately examine the generalizability of negotiation models across countries.

Economic Inequality and Social Entrepreneurship

2017 ◽  
Vol 57 (6) ◽  
pp. 1150-1190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Saurav Pathak ◽  
Etayankara Muralidharan
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Social Entrepreneurship ◽  
Economic Inequality ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Income Mobility ◽  
Global Competitiveness ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Country Level ◽  
Level Data

This article explores the extent to which income inequality and income mobility—both considered indicators of economic inequality and conditions of formal regulatory institutions (government activism)—facilitate or constrain the emergence of social entrepreneurship. Using 77,983 individual-level responses obtained from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) survey of 26 countries, and supplementing with country-level data obtained from the Global Competitiveness Report of the World Economic Forum, our results from multilevel analyses demonstrate that country-level income inequality increases the likelihood of individual-level engagement in social entrepreneurship, while income mobility decreases this likelihood. Further, income mobility negatively moderates the influence of income inequality on social entrepreneurship, such that the condition of low income mobility and high income inequality is a stronger predictor of social entrepreneurship. We discuss implications and limitations of our study, and we suggest avenues for future research.

scholarly journals Inequality in physical activity, global trends by income inequality and gender in adults

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Chastin SFM ◽  
J. Van Cauwenberg ◽  
L. Maenhout ◽  
G. Cardon ◽  
E. V. Lambert ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Physical Activity ◽  
Health Care ◽  
Income Inequality ◽  
Physical Inactivity ◽  
World Health ◽  
Middle Income ◽  
Physical Activity Guidelines ◽  
Middle Income Countries ◽  
Country Level ◽  
The World

Abstract Background Physical inactivity is a global pandemic associated with a high burden of disease and premature mortality. There is also a trend in growing economic inequalities which impacts population health. There is no global analysis of the relationship between income inequality and population levels of physical inactivity. Methods Two thousand sixteen World Health Organisation’s country level data about compliance with the 2010 global physical activity guidelines were analysed against country level income interquantile ratio data obtained from the World Bank, OECD and World Income Inequality Database. The analysis was stratified by country income (Low, Middle and High) according to the World Bank classification and gender. Multiple regression was used to quantify the association between physical activity and income inequality. Models were adjusted for GDP and percentage of GDP spent on health care for each country and out of pocket health care spent. Results Significantly higher levels of inactivity and a wider gap between the percentage of women and men meeting global physical activity guidelines were found in countries with higher income inequality in high and middle income countries irrespective of a country wealth and spend on health care. For example, in higher income countries, for each point increase in the interquantile ratio data, levels of inactivity in women were 3.73% (CI 0.89 6.57) higher, levels of inactivity in men were 2.04% (CI 0.08 4.15) higher and the gap in inactivity levels between women and men was 1.50% larger (CI 0.16 2.83). Similar relationships were found in middle income countries with lower effect sizes. These relationships were, however, not demonstrated in the low-income countries. Conclusions Economic inequalities, particularly in high- and middle- income countries might contribute to physical inactivity and might be an important factor to consider and address in order to combat the global inactivity pandemic and to achieve the World Health Organisation target for inactivity reduction.

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