Ethnicity, Gender, and Depressive Symptoms in Older Workers

We used data from a prospective investigation of full-time workers aged 58 to 64 years and residing in a North Carolina metropolitan area at baseline to examine a causal model for depressive symptomatology among White men, White women, African American men and African American women. We found significant group differences. (1) White men were more vulnerable to social network losses than White women; (2) Work stressors had long-term effects on African American men whose levels of depressive symptoms were also elevated by poor health and retirement; and (3) The influence of income was more dominant among African Americans and its effect was greater for African American women.