Accepted for/Published in: Journal of Medical Internet Research
Date Submitted: Mar 22, 2021
Date Accepted: Aug 1, 2021
Date Submitted to PubMed: Aug 12, 2021
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Exploring the Effect of Discrimination-related Experience, Worry and Social Media Exposure on Depression Among Asians in the U.S. During COVID-19: Cross-Sectional Survey Study
ABSTRACT
Background:
The outbreak of COVID-19 has spurred increasing anti-Asian racism and xenophobia in the United States, which can compromise the psychological well-being among Asian people. The impact of racial discrimination fueled by a global pandemic on the well-being remains unclear. This study is a novel attempt to empirically examine how racial discrimination during COVID-19 would be associated with depression among Asians in the United States.
Objective:
We investigated three discrimination-related variables, including experience of discrimination, worry about discrimination, and social media exposure to racism-related information during COVID-19, and aimed to examine how three variables were related to depression among Asians in the United States.
Methods:
A cross-sectional online survey was conducted. A total of 222 people (Mage = 33.53, SD = 11.35; 46.40% female) who identified themselves as Asian or Asian American and resided in the United States completed the questionnaire.
Results:
Our study showed that only experience of discrimination was significantly associated with depression among US Asians (β=.29, P =.002), whereas worry about discrimination ((β=.13, P=.128) and social media exposure to racism-related information ((β=.09, P=.209) were not. Meanwhile, our study also suggested that those who were younger (β=-.17, P=.021), not married (β=-.15, P=.046), infected by COVID-19 (β=.23, P=.001) and whose income were affected because of the pandemic (β=.13, P=.046) were more vulnerable to depression.
Conclusions:
The present study provides preliminary evidence about the impact of racial discrimination during COVID-19 on mental health among Asian people. Based on our findings, future research could advance the understanding of incident-induced discrimination in relation to the well-being by identifying moderators that may buffer or exacerbate the influence of such racial discrimination. Practically, developing effective and tailored interventions to address different demographic groups’ needs in a timely fashion is much-need to help Asians cope with racial discrimination during an unprecedented global health crisis.
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