Description
Population health research has given little attention to the intersectional inequities that gender minority people of color (GM POC) face in relation to their mental health. I hope to add to this knowledge gap through my quantitative study that addresses these research questions: 1) What is the association between gender identity and poor mental health days? 2) Can this association be explained by housing insecurity, food insecurity, health care insecurity, and social support mediators? 3) Do interactions of gender identity and race/ethnicity impact poor mental health days? I conducted negative binomial and logistic regressions using Stata to analyze 2014-2015 data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (N = 292,160). These years of data were selected because they had information on the four theoretical mechanisms. My first hypothesis was that gender questioning and transgender non-binary adults would face worse rates of poor mental health days than transfeminine, transmasculine, and cisgender adults, accounting for race/ethnicity. My second hypothesis was that economic insecurity and social support mechanisms would help explain associations between GM indicators and mental health. My third hypothesis was that some GM and POC categories would interact to exacerbate mental health for certain POC GMs. Overall, I did not find support for my first and second hypothesis. I found some support for my last hypothesis. One noteworthy and persistent result that emerged was that transmasculine adults had worse mental health outcomes than all other GM and cisgender adults. Although not statistically significant, other/multiracial transmasculine, other/multiracial transgender non-binary, and Black transmasculine adults faced worse predicted rates of poor mental health days than other POC GMs and White cisgender adults. Other complex nuances in mental health disparities were also revealed. Lastly, limitations and future directions of the present study were discussed.
