Even if a teen is at a healthy weight, just thinking they are overweight can greatly raise their odds for self-harm, a new study finds. “What we found was that the perception of being overweight has a much stronger effect of suicidal ideation than the objective measure of weight,” said study lead author Philip Baiden. He’s associate professor of social work at the University of Texas at Arlington. In the study, Baiden and colleagues looked at 2015-2021 data on more than 39,000 U.S. teens, ages 14 to 18, collected by surveys conducted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).  Some of the data focused on key factors in these kids’ lives: Their families’ socioeconomic status, dynamics within the family, pressures at school and tough issues experienced in childhood.  Other information about their lives was also gleaned from parents and other caregivers and school records. The Texas team focused especially on any self-reports of suicidal thoughts (ideation). Teens who thought they were overweight had triple the odds of these intrusive thoughts, the study found. “Even after adjusting for established suicidal ideation risk factors such as feelings of hopelessness, bullying, cyberbullying, substance use and demographic variables, we still found a connection between how adolescents feel about their weight and whether they are considering self-harm,” said study co-author Catherine LaBrenz.  “We also found that females…  read on >  read on >

Chronic ills like heart disease, asthma or diabetes afflict a majority of U.S. workers, but 60% of those affected say they’ve kept their health issue a secret from employers, a new poll finds. More than a third of workers battling chronic conditions also said they’d skipped a necessary medical appointment over the past year for reasons related to work. “Workers commonly feel stigmatized by their conditions, and this can have a profound effect on both their work and their health,” survey lead author Gillian SteelFisher concluded. She directs the Harvard Opinion Research Program and is a principal research scientist at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. The new poll was conducted in early October of last year. It included a nationally representative sampling of 1,010 part-time and full-time working adults, all of whom were part of organizations with 50 or more employees. A majority of those polled — 58% — said they had at least one form of chronic health condition, such as high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes or asthma.  Among this group, 76% said they needed to find the time and resources to manage their health issue during working hours, but 60% said they had never informed their boss that they had a chronic health condition. “Though employers may think they know their employees’ needs, poll results suggest there are widespread and…  read on >  read on >

Want to thrive in tough, stressful times? Stay playful. That’s the take-home message from a new study of who fared best, in terms of mental resiliency, during the COVID-19 pandemic. The researchers said the findings have relevance to weathering any sort of trying times. “Playful” people differ from others in that they display “greater optimism when envisioning future possibilities,” are more creative when it comes to solving problems, and attempt to “infuse quality and enjoyment into everyday activities,” explained study lead author Xiangyou “Sharon” Shen of Oregon State University (OSU) in Corvallis.  Her team’s study, published Feb. 9 in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, tracked the mental health outcomes for 503 individuals throughout the pandemic.  Psychologists already acknowledge playfulness as an important personality trait, and there’s even a Playfulness Trait Scale to measure it.  According to Shen, during the pandemic folks who scored high on the scale “actively altered challenging situations, found creative substitutes for what was lost, viewed obstacles as opportunities for growth and maintained a strong sense of control over their responses.” More playful people tended to stress out less during the COVID years, compared to less-playful types, the study found. Shen said that playful folk did not necessarily engage in different activities or do any particular activity more often.  Instead, they became more deeply involved in whatever activity they were in; were more…  read on >  read on >

About 93% of people worldwide who struggle with mental health or substance abuse issues aren’t getting adequate care, a new report finds. In many cases, people affected by mental illness do not recognize that they have a diagnosable condition, the Canadian research team found.  But even when diagnoses are made, treatment is often lacking.  Men seemed more likely to go untreated than women, the study found.  Globally, “women were 50% more likely to receive effective treatment despite men having more than twice the substance use disorders prevalence and suicide death rate than women,” wrote a team led by Dr. Daniel Vigo. He’s an associate professor of psychiatry and population and public health at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. The new data came from World Health Organization surveys involving nearly 57,000 participants in 21 countries, conducted over a 19-year period.  Countries included the United States and Japan, as well as many nations in Western and Eastern Europe and South America. Participants all met standard criteria for having a mental illness, including substance abuse disorders. People were quizzed on whether they: Recognized their need for treatment Made contact with the healthcare system about it Received a minimum level of adequate treatment Received effective treatment Less than half (46.5%) recognized that they had a condition that merited treatment, the researchers reported.  In the group that did…  read on >  read on >

When and what you eat might play a role in maintaining good mental health, a new study suggests. Researchers in China found that folks with heart disease were more likely to keep depression at bay if they ate a big, calorie-rich breakfast.  There’s evidence that heart disease patients “are more likely to develop depression when compared to the general population — and dietary factors have been shown to play an important role in depression occurrence and development,” noted a team led by Hongquan Xie of the Harbin Medical University. They published their findings recently in BMC Medicine. According to the researchers, the timing of calorie intake “can regulate circadian rhythms and metabolism,” and disruptions in circadian rhythms may be a contributor to depression. Heart disease patients are already at heightened risk for depression, so the new study looked at possible links between daily meals and a patient’s mental health. The team looked at 2003-2018 data from almost 32,000 Americans who enrolled in the U.S. National Health and Nutritional Examination Survey.  Almost 3,500 participants (averaging 66 years of age) had heart disease, and 554 of those people were also diagnosed with depression.  Survey participants also reported what and when they ate during a typical day. The data showed that people who took in the most calories at breakfast (791 calories on average) were 30% less prone to…  read on >  read on >

Turns out, looking on the bright side may do more than lift your mood!  It could also help you save money, especially if you’re on a tight budget. A study published recently in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology  found that people who are more optimistic about the future tend to save more money over time, even after accounting for income, personality traits and financial literacy. “We often think of optimism as rose-colored glasses that might lead people to save less for the future,” lead author Joe Gladstone of the University of Colorado Boulder, said in a news release. “But our research suggests optimism may actually be an important psychological resource that helps people save, especially when facing economic hardship.” The study analyzed data from more than 140,000 people across the U.S., the U.K. and 14 European countries. Researchers examined survey responses measuring “dispositional optimism” where participants rated statements like “Overall, I expect more good things to happen to me than bad,” or “In uncertain times, I usually expect the best.” What did they find?  Higher optimism was linked to greater savings, even among folks with lower incomes. And even a slight improvement in optimism scores was linked to $1,352 in savings. The link between optimism and savings remained even when researchers controlled for other factors like age, gender, relationship status, parental status, childhood…  read on >  read on >

Heavy weed use may be far more dangerous than people realize, according to a pair of studies published in JAMA Network Open. People diagnosed with cannabis use disorder (CUD) may face nearly triple the risk of death over five years compared to those without the disorder, according to a large study published Feb. 6. The study, conducted in Ontario, Canada, found that people treated for CUD in hospitals or emergency rooms were 10 times more likely to die by suicide than those in the general population. They were also significantly more likely to die from trauma, drug poisoning and lung cancer, researchers found. A separate study — published Feb. 4 — linked rising cases of psychosis and schizophrenia in Canada to CUD since the country legalized recreational marijuana in 2018. Researchers suspect C.U.D. is even more widespread than the data indicate.  When they analyzed Ontario health records from 106,994 people diagnosed with CUD during a hospital or emergency room visit between 2006 and 2021, researchers found: 3.5% of people with CUD died within five years of treatment, compared to 0.6% of a similar group of people without CUD. CUD patients still had a 2.8 times higher risk of death than the general population even after other risk factors like mental illness, heart disease, cancer and other substance use were considered. Young adults aged 25 to…  read on >  read on >