Neighbourhood Structural and Social Factors and Mental Health

Current evidence suggests that the places where people live affect their health and contribute to health inequalities between the individuals. Neighbourhood conditions affect people’s health over and above individual factors, such as socioeconomic position. Although studies have shown that the role of neighbourhood factors for health is relatively small compared to individual socio-demographic and socioeconomic factors, changing them has the potential to influence many people living in a neighbourhood and therefore to contribute to the reduction of social and ethnic inequalities in health. Despite the considerable geographical differences in mental health outcomes, such as common mental disorders, mood and anxiety disorders and depression, the impact of neighbourhoods on individual mental health has been understudied. Understanding the role and impact of neighbourhoods on depression might be important for prevention of disease burden of mental health. This thesis aimed to investigate which and how the neighbourhood factors influence mental health among urban adult residents