Research summary on contemporary topics

Grzywacz, Joseph G., Sara a. Quandt, Haiying Chen, Scott Isom, Lisa Kiang, Quirina Vallejos, & Thomas a. Arcury. (2010). Depressive symptoms among Latino farm workers across the agricultural season: Structural and situational influences. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, 16 (3) 335 -- 343

Authors' research questions and hypotheses

The purpose of the 2010 descriptive psychological research study "Depressive symptoms among Latino farm workers across the agricultural season: Structural and situational influences" by Joseph G. Grzywacz, Sara a. Quandt, Haiying Chen, Scott Isom, Lisa Kiang, Quirina Vallejos, and Thomas a. Arcury was to study the mental health status of Latino agricultural workers over an extensive period of time. Previous studies had focused simply on the presence of depressive symptoms in migrant workers, rather than the symptoms' evolution over the course of a particular growing and harvesting season.

Grzywacz (et al. 2010) hypothesized that Latino farm worker's mental status varied depending upon the individual worker's exposure to structurally-related stressors like chronic poverty and situational stressors in the form of single, catastrophic events like the threat of deportation. The study's authors believed that depressive symptoms could not be studied in a homogenous fashion.

To justify the study, the authors noted that in the past it had been found that approximately 40% of farm workers in the upper Midwest and North Carolina had symptoms of clinical depression symptoms, and such symptoms (along with alcohol use and abuse) have a high correlation with occupationally-related injuries. Preventing, identifying, and treating depression is essential. "This study used prospective data obtained at monthly intervals across one 4-month agricultural season from a large sample of Latino farm workers in North Carolina (N 288) to document variation in depressive symptoms across the agricultural season and delineate structural and situational factors associated with mental health trajectories across time" (Grzywacz et al. 2010: 335).

Describe the author's methods

The 4-moth duration of the study was selected because authors were interested in changes in the worker's mental health status, which they felt had been inadequately addressed in existing literature, and their hypothesis of the individualized nature of persons' responses to specific stressors over time (Grzywacz et al. 2010: 336). The data was accumulated by trained interviewers regarding worker's mental health status. They used a 10-item version of the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression (CES-D) scale to measure depressive symptoms. "Descriptive statistics were used to examine the distributions of the individual-level variables" (Grzywacz et al. 2010: 337).

Results including analyses performed

Depressive symptoms were not uniformly constant, but highest in the beginning of the agricultural season, as the workers adjusted to their new conditions. The symptoms then abated, but at the end of the season when the worker's uncertainty about finding further work increased, depression increased. Situational variables such as legal threats of deportation also impacted worker's depression, and undocumented workers lacking an H2A were far more apt to manifest depression, even if they suffered from the same symptoms of poverty as their fellow documented employees.

Critique