Acculturation and the Lifetime Risk of Psychiatric and Substance Use Disorders among Hispanics
2000/11/01 by ALEXANDER N. ORTEGA, Alexander N. Ortega, Robert A. Rosenheck +5 · 354 citations
Health Professions · Medicine · Psychology · Social Sciences · #Acculturation #Comorbidity #Demography #Employment and Welfare Studies #Ethnic group #Geography #Gerontology #Immigration #Latin Americans #Medicine #Migration, Health and Trauma #National Comorbidity Survey #Psychiatry #Psychology #Racial and Ethnic Identity Research #Substance abuse
paper · doi:10.1097/00005053-200011000-00002
published in The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease 188(11), 728-735 (Lippincott Williams & Wilkins)
openalex publication_date 2000/11/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
Abstract
Between 1981 and 1995, approximately 5 million people from either Mexico, Cuba, Central America, or South America immigrated to the United States. Some regional studies have suggested that as Hispanic immigrants become acculturated to American society, their risk of mental illness increases sharply. This study examined the lifetime risk of psychiatric and substance use disorders among U.S. Hispanic subgroups and the specific role of nativity, parental nativity, language preferences, and other sociodemographic characteristics as risk factors for these disorders. The study used the National Comorbidity Survey (NCS), a national probability sample of 8098 U.S. adults aged 15 to 54. Selected DSM-III-R psychiatric diagnoses were collapsed into eight categories. When compared with non-Hispanic whites, Mexican-Americans were less likely to have any psychiatric disorder. After multivariate adjustment, acculturation items predicted greater risk of having any DSM-III-R disorders for Mexican-Americans and "other" Hispanics and greater risk of having a substance abuse disorder for Puerto Ricans, among other significant relationships. The results suggest that there is likely to be an increasing prevalence of psychiatric and substance use disorders among Hispanics that may be attributable to increasing levels of acculturation among the more than 5 million recent immigrants from Latin America.
Citations
Cited by
- Psychosocial and neurobiological aspects of the worldwide refugee crisis: From vulnerability to resilience
- Immigration, lack of control and psychological distress: Findings from the Oslo Health Study
- ACCULTURATION AND LATINO HEALTH IN THE UNITED STATES: A Review of the Literature and its Sociopolitical Context
- Prevalence, Correlates, Disability, and Comorbidity of DSM-IV Alcohol Abuse and Dependence in the United States
- Undocumented Immigration, Drug Problems, and Driving Under the Influence in the United States, 1990–2014
- Immigration to the United States and acculturation as risk factors for asthma and allergy
- Considering context, place and culture: the National Latino and Asian American Study. [europepmc]
- Acculturation and Latino health in the United States: a review of the literature and its sociopolitical context. [europepmc]
- Alcohol use in New York after the terrorist attacks: a study of the effects of psychological trauma on drinking behavior. [europepmc]
- Alcohol use, mental health status and psychological well-being 2 years after the World Trade Center attacks in New York City. [europepmc]
- Latino adults' access to mental health care: a review of epidemiological studies. [europepmc]
- Psychiatric disorders among foreign-born and US-born Asian-Americans in a US national survey. [europepmc]
- Co-occurrence of mental and physical illness in US Latinos. [europepmc]
- Risk for psychiatric disorder among immigrants and their US-born descendants: evidence from the National Comorbidity Survey Replication. [europepmc]
- Understanding differences in past year psychiatric disorders for Latinos living in the US. [europepmc]
- Mental health and substance use disorders among Latino and Asian American lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults. [europepmc]
- Substance abuse prevalence and treatment among Latinos and Latinas. [europepmc]
- The Hispanic Americans Baseline Alcohol Survey (HABLAS): the association between birthplace, acculturation and alcohol abuse and dependence across Hispanic national groups. [europepmc]
- Immigration to the USA and risk for mood and anxiety disorders: variation by origin and age at immigration. [europepmc]
- Looking Beyond Nativity: The Relation of Age of Immigration, Length of Residence, and Birth Cohorts to the Risk of Onset of Psychiatric Disorders for Latinos. [europepmc]
- Pathways and correlates connecting Latinos' mental health with exposure to the United States. [europepmc]
- Race/ethnic differences in exposure to traumatic events, development of post-traumatic stress disorder, and treatment-seeking for post-traumatic stress disorder in the United States. [europepmc]
- Prevalence of psychiatric illnesses in older ethnic minority adults. [europepmc]
- Stress, Allostatic Load and Health of Mexican Immigrants. [europepmc]
- A cross-national study on Mexico-US migration, substance use and substance use disorders. [europepmc]
- Migration from Mexico to the United States and subsequent risk for depressive and anxiety disorders: a cross-national study. [europepmc]
- The role of migration in the development of depressive symptoms among Latino immigrant parents in the USA. [europepmc]
- The Hispanic Americans Baseline Alcohol Survey (HABLAS): the association between acculturation, birthplace and alcohol consumption across Hispanic national groups. [europepmc]
- Migration circumstances, psychological distress, and self-rated physical health for Latino immigrants in the United States. [europepmc]
- Sleep and its Relationship to Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Cardiovascular Disease. [europepmc]
- Associations between childhood adversity, adult stressful life events, and past-year drug use disorders in the National Epidemiological Study of Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC). [europepmc]
Related