The Mental Health of Aboriginal Peoples: Transformations of Identity and Community
The Canadian Journal of PsychiatryPublished 1 September 2000Open access
Laurence J. Kirmayer, Gregory Brass, Caroline L. Tait
Citations644
SJR quartileQ1
SJR score1.43
SNIP1.19
Generate an AI Snapshot to get a quick, structured summary of this paper.
Study Snapshot
ObjectiveStudy objective
MethodsResearch methodology
PopulationPopulation studied
Sample sizeSample sizes
OutcomesStudy outcomes here
ResultsStudy results comes here
LimitationsResearch study limitations comes here
A concise AI-generated summary of the paper will appear here once you click Generate AI Snapshot.
TL;DR
Evidence for the social origins of mental health problems and the ongoing responses of individuals and communities to the legacy of colonization are summarized and illustrated.
Abstract
This paper reviews some recent research on the mental health of the First Nations, Inuit, and Métis of Canada. We summarize evidence for the social origins of mental health problems and illustrate the ongoing responses of individuals and communities to the legacy of colonization. Cultural discontinuity and oppression have been linked to high rates of depression, alcoholism, suicide, and violence in many communities, with the greatest impact on youth. Despite these challenges, many communities have done well, and research is needed to identify the factors that promote wellness. Cultural psychiatry can contribute to rethinking mental health services and health promotion for indigenous populations and communities.
Keywords
Social SciencesHealth Professions
American PsychologistThe psychological measurement of cultural syndromes.
1,396 Citations1996Harry C. Triandis
Transcultural PsychiatryCultural Continuity as a Hedge against Suicide in Canada's First Nations
1,034 Citations1998Michael J. Chandler, Christopher E. Lalonde
Medical Entomology and ZoologyManifest Manners: Narratives on Postindian Survivance
911 Citations1999Gerald Vizenor
BMJParticipatory research maximises community and lay involvement
647 Citations1999Ann C. Macaulay, L Commanda +5 more
This article summarises the final draft of the North American Primary Care Research Group's ploicy statement for participatory research, which was developed to help improve social and economic conditions, to effect change, and to reduce the distrust of the people being studied.
American Holocaust
527 Citations1992David E. Stannard
SAGE Publications, Inc. eBooksIndigenous psychologies: Research and experience in cultural context.
501 Citations1993Uichol Kim, John W. Berry
Journal of AdolescenceEthnic identity and self‐esteem: an exploratory longitudinal study
469 Citations1992Jean S. Phinney, Víctor Chavira
Results of this exploratory study showed a significant change to higher stages of ethnic identity over the three-year period and self-esteem and ethnic identity were significantly related to each other at each time period and across theThree-year time span.
The American Indian QuarterlyAmerican Indian Holocaust and Survival: A Population History Since 1492
404 Citations1990C. Matthew Snipp, Russell Thornton
American AnthropologistUniversal Aspects of Symbolic Healing: A Theoretical Synthesis
386 Citations1986James Dow
Aboriginal Studies Press eBooksPast and present : the construction of aboriginality
225 Citations1988Jeremy Beckett
Medical Entomology and Zoology'Being Alive Well': Health and the Politics of Cree Well-Being
211 Citations2000Naomi Adelson
The author argues that definitions of health are not simply reflections of physiological soundness but convey broader cultural and political realities, thus linking individual bodies to a larger socio-political reality.
Western Historical QuarterlyA Narrow Vision: Duncan Campbell Scott and the Administration of Indian Affairs in Canada
209 Citations1988David Reed Miller, E. Brian Titley
Social Science & MedicineFrom DSM-I to III-R; voices of self, mastery and the other: A cultural constructivist reading of U.S. psychiatric classification
201 Citations1992Atwood D. Gaines
Professional psychiatric classification expresses an underlying cultural psychology which encompasses four phenomenological domains and one of three Western person conceptions, which is found to be explorations of culturally meaningful etiologies that explain the absence of 'self control', a central ethnopsychological aspect of the idealized self.
Transcultural Psychiatric Research ReviewSuicide Among Canadian Aboriginal Peoples
187 Citations1994Laurence J. Kirmayer
Disease and Social Diversity
166 Citations1994Stephen J. Kunitz
This work analyzes the patterns of death in the Fourth World, settlement Capitalism and the State in Australia, and Estimates of Various Polynesian Populations: 1790s-1980s to find the size and definition of Indigenous Populations.
Medical Entomology and ZoologyEthnicity, Immigration, and Psychopathology
156 Citations2004Ihsan Al‐Issa, Michel Tousignant
Choice Reviews OnlineThe way of the pipe: aboriginal spirituality and symbolic healing in Canadian prisons
155 Citations1998
Canadian Public PolicyNative Peoples: The Canadian Experience
154 Citations1996Rita M. Bienvenue, Bruce R. Morrison +1 more
American EthnologistDomesticity in the federal Indian schools: the power of authority over mind and body
149 Citations1993K. Tsianina Lomawaima
Medical Entomology and ZoologyMental Health Services: The Cross-Cultural Context
126 Citations1984Paul Pedersen, Norman Sartorius +1 more
Paul B Pedersen Introduction The Cultural Complexity of Mental Health Part One Culture-General Applications Juris G Draguns Assessing Mental Health and Disorder Across Cultures Raymond Prince Shamans and Endorphins Exogenous and Endogenous Factors in Psychotherapy.
OceaniaEssentialism, Memory and Resistance: Aboriginality and the Politics of Authenticity
126 Citations1993Andrew Lattas
Western Historical QuarterlyCanada's First Nations: A History of Founding Peoples from Earliest Times
122 Citations1993D. Peter MacLeod, Olive Patricia Dickason
British Journal of Clinical PsychologySense of coherence, self‐esteem, depression and hopelessness as correlates of reattempting suicide
121 Citations1992Keith J. Petrie, Richard Brook
Overall prediction of suicidal behaviour was enhanced by also including the background variables of age, a history of previous attempts, unemployment and whether the attempter was living alone, and the importance of widening the focus when assessing and predicting suicidal risk to include not only predictions based on pathology but also psychological factors that promote adjustment.
The Health of Native Americans
110 Citations1994T. Kue Young
Coping and Self-Concept in Adolescence
108 Citations1990Harke A. Bosma, Anne Jackson
PsychiatryPsychiatric Epidemiology of an Indian Village<sup>†</sup>
98 Citations1973James H. Shore, J. David Kinzie +2 more
The Canadian Journal of PsychiatryAttempted Suicide among Inuit Youth: Psychosocial Correlates and Implications for Prevention
84 Citations1998Laurence J. Kirmayer, Lucy J. Boothroyd +1 more
Suicide prevention programs can be targeted at youth who are using substances, particularly solvents, cocaine, and alcohol, have psychiatric illness, and have experienced recent negative life events.
Acta Psychiatrica ScandinavicaSuicide attempts among Inuit youth: a community survey of prevalence and risk factors
80 Citations1996Laurence J. Kirmayer, Michael Malus +1 more
The high prevalence and effect of family problems on likelihood of suicide attempts indicate the need for family‐ and community‐based approaches.
The Journal of Nervous and Mental DiseaseInuit Attitudes Toward Deviant Behavior: A Vignette Study
75 Citations1997Laurence J. Kirmayer, Christopher Fletcher +1 more
Inuit attitudes toward deviant behavior are influenced more by perceived familiarity and likelihood of recovery than by labels, causal attributions, or explanations, and the indigenous psychological concept of isumaluttuq does not serve to reduce social stigma.
The Journal of Nervous and Mental DiseasePsychiatric Epidemiology of an Indian Village
74 Citations1992J. David Kinzie, PAUL K. LEUNG +7 more
The prevalence of psychiatric disorders was lower in the current study, but the rates for alcohol disorders and affective disorders were still far higher than those reported in Epidemiologic Catchment Area studies.
Cambridge University Press eBooksThe Native American Renaissance, 1960–1995
66 Citations1996Wilcomb E. Washburn
Choice Reviews OnlineNative and Christian: indigenous voices on religious identity in the United States and Canada
66 Citations1996
New Directions for Child and Adolescent DevelopmentSelf-continuity in suicidal and nonsuicidal adolescents
58 Citations1994Michael J. Chandler
A developmental account is given of the role of self-continuity in insulating adolescents against the risks of suicide.
Transcultural PsychiatryRe-Imagining Aboriginality: An Indigenous Peoples’Response to Social Suffering
58 Citations2000Naomi Adelson
Medical Anthropology QuarterlySeal Blood, Inuit Blood, and Diet: A Biocultural Model of Physiology and Cultural Identity
57 Citations1991Kristen Borré
The cultural model has four linked components which provide an explanation of why Inuit select the foods they do, and complements current scientific nutritional knowledge and can be shown to influence individual behavior under certain circumstances.
Health An Interdisciplinary Journal for the Social Study of Health Illness and MedicineHealth beliefs and the politics of Cree well-being
49 Citations1998Naomi Adelson
Journal of Studies on AlcoholAlcohol dependence and conduct disorder among Navajo Indians.
49 Citations1999Stephen J. Kunitz, K. R. Gabriel +7 more
It is shown that none of the potential biases invalidate the findings, which support the hypothesis that in this population conduct disorder is a risk for alcohol dependence.
Medical Entomology and ZoologyControversial Issues in Mental Health
49 Citations1993Stuart A. Kirk, Susan D. Einbinder
American Journal of PsychiatryMental disorders among Native American children: rates and risk periods for entering treatment
44 Citations1982Morton Beiser, Carolyn L. Attneave
The authors compared national data on use of outpatient mental health services by Native American children in 1974 with 1969 data on non-Indian children and found Indian children were at higher risk for entering the treatment system than were nonIndian children.
The American Indian QuarterlyThe Lakota Ritual of the Sweat Lodge: History and Contemporary Practice
40 Citations1999Kathleen Pickering, Raymond A. Bucko
Journal of Cross-Cultural PsychologyThe Prevalence of Mental Disorders Among Saskatchewan Indians
40 Citations1970Chunilal Roy, Adjit Choudhuri +1 more
Transcultural PsychiatryPsychological Distress among the Cree of James Bay
39 Citations2000Laurence J. Kirmayer, Lucy J. Boothroyd +3 more
AnthropologicaDeviance: Anthropological Perspectives
37 Citations1992Richard A. Brymer, Morris Freilich +2 more
Canadian Psychiatric Association JournalPrevalence of Psychiatric Disorders in a Southern Baffin Island Eskimo Settlement
36 Citations1974Harshavardhan Sampath
This study shows not only that most of the major mental disorders do exist in contemporary Eskimo settlements but also that their prevalence is high when compared to the rates found in southern communities.
The Canadian Journal of PsychiatryMeasuring Self-Perceived Role Competence among First Nations and Non Native Children
34 Citations1993Morton Beiser, William J. Lancee +3 more
The Flower of Two Soils scales are suitable for children from elementary schools, from First Nations and the majority culture, and an agreement between self- and teacher-rated competence which is higher for non native than for native children.
Choice Reviews OnlineShamanic healing and ritual drama: health and medicine in native North American religious traditions
33 Citations1993
Cambridge University Press eBooksEntertaining strangers: North America in the sixteenth century
31 Citations1996Bruce G. Trigger, William R. Swagerty
The Problem of Self-Continuity in the Context of Rapid Personal and Cultural Change
24 Citations1995Michael J. Chandler, Christopher E. Lalonde
Transcultural PsychiatryAnomie and Demoralization in Transitional Cultures: The Australian Aboriginal Model
19 Citations2000Donald Spencer
Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric EpidemiologyRisk factors for conduct disorder among Navajo Indian men and women
17 Citations1999Stephen J. Kunitz, K. R. Gabriel +7 more
Many of the risk factors that are associated with conduct disorder in other populations are also risk factors in the Navajo population, raising the possibility that conduct disorder has become more prevalent, as is thought to be the case nationwide.