Table 5. Adjusted odds ratios; longitudinal analysis (Wave 1–17 data: March 10, 2020–November 30, 2020); outcome variables: Reporting symptoms for anxiety and depression (Column 1), anxiety (Column 2), and depression (Column 3).
| Probable anxiety and depression | Probable anxiety | Probable depression | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Race (Reference is non-Black) | |||
| Black (March) | 0.487*** | 0.474*** | 0.522*** |
| [0.308,0.771] | [0.319,0.704] | [0.330,0.824] | |
| Black (April) | 0.541*** | 0.563*** | 0.447*** |
| [0.379,0.772] | [0.410,0.773] | [0.304,0.658] | |
| Black (May) | 0.520*** | 0.571*** | 0.574*** |
| [0.351,0.771] | [0.406,0.801] | [0.404,0.815] | |
| Black (June) | 0.582** | 0.559*** | 0.624** |
| [0.376,0.900] | [0.373,0.836] | [0.411,0.946] | |
| Black (July) | 0.465*** | 0.439*** | 0.544*** |
| [0.291,0.744] | [0.295,0.653] | [0.355,0.833] | |
| Black (August) | 0.639** | 0.675** | 0.697* |
| [0.421,0.970] | [0.459,0.991] | [0.464,1.046] | |
| Black (September) | 0.590** | 0.557*** | 0.689* |
| [0.386,0.900] | [0.366,0.848] | [0.466,1.020] | |
| Black (October) | 0.542*** | 0.535*** | 0.543*** |
| [0.342,0.859] | [0.354,0.811] | [0.347,0.848] | |
| Black (November) | 0.495** | 0.495*** | 0.403*** |
| [0.282,0.869] | [0.297,0.825] | [0.221,0.737] | |
| Month (Reference is March) | |||
| April | 0.950 | 0.872 | 1.310 |
| [0.611,1.477] | [0.601,1.264] | [0.831,2.063] | |
| May | 0.663 | 0.506*** | 0.991 |
| [0.403,1.089] | [0.333,0.770] | [0.593,1.657] | |
| June | 0.395*** | 0.381*** | 0.585* |
| [0.227,0.689] | [0.235,0.618] | [0.330,1.035] | |
| July | 0.420*** | 0.350*** | 0.574* |
| [0.236,0.746] | [0.210,0.585] | [0.328,1.006] | |
| August | 0.426*** | 0.311*** | 0.631 |
| [0.241,0.754] | [0.187,0.518] | [0.361,1.104] | |
| September | 0.545** | 0.418*** | 0.733 |
| [0.328,0.907] | [0.257,0.682] | [0.436,1.232] | |
| October | 0.548** | 0.397*** | 0.824 |
| [0.324,0.927] | [0.245,0.645] | [0.478,1.420] | |
| November | 0.452** | 0.348*** | 0.647 |
| [0.241,0.849] | [0.200,0.606] | [0.338,1.238] | |
| Covariates included | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Covariates interacted with time variable | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Observations | 96,312 | 96,328 | 96,382 |
| Pseudo R-squared | 0.143 | 0.118 | 0.143 |
* p<0.10;
** p<0.05;
*** p<0.01.
95% CIs are in parentheses. Fig 1 presents predicted probabilities of having probable anxiety and depression (together with 95% CIs) for each month from March 10 to November 30 for both Black and non-Black Americans separately. Fig 1 reveals that the monthly gap in mental health outcomes between Black and non-Black Americans remained throughout from March of 2020 to November of 2020, and that the gap in depression began to widen starting in September. The predicted probabilities adjusted for age (18–34, 35–54, 55–64, 65+), highest educational attainment (high school diploma or GED and below, some college, college and above), household income ($0–29,99, $30,000–59,999, $60000–99,999, $100,000 or more), gender (male, female), whether a household has children or not, employment status (employed, unemployed, others), and baseline pre-pandemic CES-D score. Stata’s “margins” command was used to generate predicted probabilities and “marginsplot” command was used to generate the above graphs after estimating the logistic regressions using the odds ratio (or) option.