By Yaminah Muhammad
In recent years, mental health awareness has grown into a leading global issue. And with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently classifying mental illnesses among the most common health conditions in the U.S., the interest and concern regarding mental health continues to rise. As a result, individuals along with the general public are able to take an indepth look into their own mental health and that of their communities.
However, despite this global rise in interest in mental health, members of some communities believe more attention still needs to be geared toward the psychological and emotional struggles they face. This is particularly true for members of Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) communities who are oftentimes overlooked and underserved.
So, to increase awareness of mental health issues in AANHPI communities, the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research and AAPI Data, based at UC Riverside, published a 67-page report detailing the psychological toll burdening these communities.
The report, titled “Piecing the Puzzle of AANPI Mental Health: A Community Analysis of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Mental Health Experiences in California,” connects survey data with community experiences impacted by cultural nuances, U.S. foreign policy and intergenerational trauma.
Using data collected from 2020-2022, the report provides a granular examination of mental health experiences for Asian Americans and eight NHPI subgroups: Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islanders, Vietnamese, Filipino, South Asian, Korean, Japanese and Chinese.
“The goal of the report is to spur a more nuanced discourse on mental health for Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, and Asian American communities,” said Ninez A. Ponce, director of the UCLA CHPR and one of the report’s authors.
In addition to spurring a more nuanced discourse on mental illnesses in AANHPI communities, the…
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