Your Family May Also Influence Your Mental Health

New findings published in the Journal of Psychiatric Research show that family environment and neighborhood can hold a major impact on mental health.

American and Swedish researchers analyzed data on over 500,000 children in Sweden, covering over a decade that showed how 4.8 percent of the children had developed a psychiatric disorder.

They discovered that high neighborhood deprivation was oftentimes associated with a two-fold higher risk of conduct disorder, a 40 percent increased risk of anxiety disorder and a 20 percent increased risk of mood disorder. Following adjustment for certain individual factors, moderate neighborhood deprivation was associated with a 30 percent increased risk of ADHD.

"However, we also found that familial random effects, including both genetic and family environmental factors, accounted for six to eight times as much of the total variation in psychiatric disorders, compared with neighborhood random effects," lead study author Professor Jan Sundquist said in a statement. "The estimated risks and random effects indicate that children are strongly affected by both their family and neighborhood environments and that the former seems to be more important at a population level."

However, researchers noted that further information will be needed regarding intervention strategies in early life and the aforementioned.