What about culture?
“Culture” is a set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterize a group. We all have a culture in which we were raised and one in which each of us functions in our daily lives.
Culture influences one’s behavior and family practices. Culture influences an individual’s health beliefs, practices, behaviors, and even the outcomes of interventions. Culture influences many aspects of mental health and perceptions of mental illness, including how people from a given culture communicate and manifest their symptoms, styles of coping, family and community supports and willingness to seek treatment.
Cultural and ethnic minority communities face a social and economic environment of inequality that includes greater exposure to racism, discrimination, violence and poverty. Living in poverty has the most measurable effect on rates of mental illness. Surgeon General’s Report on Mental Health: Culture, Race and Ethnicity, 2001