“Yes We Can!” The Mental Health Significance for U.S. Black Adults of Barack Obama’s 2008 Presidential Election

Abstract

This study examines the mental health significance of Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential election for black adults. His election was a milestone moment. Hence, we expect black adults would experience improved mental health after the first self-identified black person wins election to the most powerful position in the United States. Using nationally representative survey data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS), we address this expectation by predicting poor mental health days that black adults report preelection and postelection. We find no overall difference in poor mental health days between the time periods. However, a statistical interaction between gender and time period demonstrates black men report 1.01 fewer poor mental health days after the election, whereas black women report .45 more poor mental health days after the election.

Racial and ethnic differences in blood pressure before and after the 2016 United States general election

“…Using nationally representative survey data, we found differences in elevations in both SBP and DBP by race and ethnicity following the election. In previous studies, major sociopolitical events were associated with significant changes in self‐rated health status, mental health, and cortisol levels (Brown et al, 2021; Hoyt et al, 2018; Malat et al, 2011). Recent data also suggests that incidence of cardiac arrythmias and CVD hospitalizations increased during the 2016 presidential election (Mefford et al, 2020; Rosman et al, 2021); however, the underlying mechanisms driving these increases, including potentially stress‐related increases in BP, remain unknown.…”

“…Population‐level changes in SBP among racial/ethnic minorities appeared to differ between men and women, the latter of whom, seemed to exhibit a greater increase in SBP following the election. Previous studies indicate that women tend to report higher levels of stress during the presidential election compared to men (DeJonckheere et al, 2018; Hagan et al, 2020), possibly contributing to decreased mental health (Brown et al, 2021). Our results appear consistent with these data and suggest that population‐level SBP among racial/ethnic minority women may have increased in the months following the election, possibly because of increased stress.…”

Mental Health Among Black and Latinx Sexual Minority Adults Leading Up to and Following the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election: Results from a Natural Experiment

“…With these sociopolitical shifts came the expectation of improved health and mental health outcomes for minority populations. 40 This cultural narrative of linear progress for minority populations was upended in the 2016 U.S. election, when a candidate with explicit anti-minority sentiments was elected as president. We sought to examine if there was an immediate impact of this historical event on mental health among Black and Latinx SM adults in the United States using a daily national probability sample.…”

Health and Election Outcomes: Evidence from the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election

“…This study makes several contributions to the literature. First, while previous research has examined the 2008 (Stanton et al 2010; Brown et al, 2021), 2012 (Ben-Ezra, et al, 2013), and 2016 (Hoyt, Zeiders, Chakua, Toomey, and Nair 2018; Gonzalez et al 2018; Morey et al 2021; Krueger, Westmoreland, Choi, Harper, Lightfoot, Hammack, and Meyer 2021; Abelson et al 2020; Roche and Jacobson 2019; DeJonckheere, Fisher, and Chang 2018; Yan, Hsia, Yeung, and Sloan 2021; Neupert, Bellingtier, and Smith 2021) presidential elections, little research has examined the impact of the 2020 election on the health of Americans. This lacuna is especially important given how emotionally-charged and contentious the 2020 presidential election and its aftermath were (Weinschenk, van der Linden, and Panagopoulos 2021).…”

“…Examining multiple dimensions of health in the same study is also valuable because it allows for a direct comparison of whether election-related variables have similar effects across different facets of health. Finally, in contrast to many previous studies on elections, which often infer the impact of elections on health by comparing pre and post-election data on a health measure of interest (see, e.g., Stanton et al 2010; Abelson et al 2020; Roche and Jacobson 2019; DeJonckheere, Fisher, and Chang 2018; Brown, Solazzo, and Gorman 2021; Gonzalez, Ramirez, and Galupo 2018; Krueger et al 2021; Rosman et al 2021; Hoyt, et al, 2018), we measure two individual-level variables related to the 2020 election directly—vote choice (i.e., voting for the candidate who lost the election) and (dis)agreement that Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election—and we examine their impacts on changes in self-rated health. We are not aware of previous studies that have measured an individual’s acceptance of election results and examined how this orientation impacts general and mental health.…”