Vikram Singh
South Asian Help-Seeking Behaviors and its Causes
In today's world, different cultures and traditions surround our everyday lives. It is interesting to see other people's culture and all of the positive and fun traits about it. One community, the South Asian community,is a culture known for its tight-knit family structure and emphasis on academics. While this may seem positive, it is known to inflict heavy stresses and insecurities onto first-generation South Asian youth. These stresses and insecurities later develop into mental health problems that grow worse as these children grow into adults. It is ever so important, especially in today's world, to emphasize one's mental health. Because of the high expectations and stresses put on South Asian children by their parents, the collectivistic culture of South Asian families, as well as the high prices of mental health care, South Asian youths' ability to seek mental health care is negatively affected. This research is especially important because of how important mental health is becoming nowadays. Every cultural community, not just the South Asian community, will only show progress once they address the mental health problems inflicted upon them.
First of all, high expectations and stresses are put upon South Asian children their whole lives. They constantly have to live up to these standards, leaving little to no time to focus on themselves. An example of a high expectation is academics, academics are highly emphasized in a majority of South Asian households. Many parents take it to the extreme just to make sure their kid is successful later in life. However, this can have drastic consequences. Namely, children start developing intense mental health issues that not only affects them later in life, but affects them as children:"these [high academic] expectations placed on them by their parents cause an incredible amount of stress... quite a few South Asian children crack, experiencing numerous symptoms of depression, anxiety, as well as countless illnesses that keep them out of school while they recover" (The Effects of Academic Pressure on South Asian Children 2). Experiencing these symptoms as a kid only worsens their chances of living comfortably later in life. Even if these children do seek help later in their lives, the constant pressures and anxieties forced upon them since they were children will cause scars very deep. This worsens the chance of these children getting better mentally later in life. Building upon this, it is hard to even be a child in a South Asian household when so much pressure and emphasis is put on academics most of their lives. This leads to children internalizing the pressure. This leads to children putting their studies over childlike activities such as playing. These childlike activities are essential to the healthy mental development of a child. (The Effects of Academic Pressure on South Asian Children 11). Conditioning children to prioritize academics most of their lives will often lead to the prioritization of work and schooling when other things could need to be prioritized. For example, mental health. An example of a stressor that South Asian households inflict is emotional manipulation. Emotional manipulation is a common thing inflicted upon South Asian children by their parents. This is more likely to put South Asian children at risk for depression and anxiety later in their lives. A commonplace for South Asian parents is the use of guilt-trip tactics and ultimatums used by the parents to get their kids to do their bidding (Mim 6). Experiencing constant emotional manipulation like this can lead to children developing mental health issues such as delinquency or depression. Psychologist Brian K. Barber conducted a study examining the effects of manipulation done by parents on their children, "The survey studies also showed that psychological control is a significant predictor for youth problem behaviors. Whether with depression or delinquency, these findings are noteworthy" (p. 3313). Inflicting these high expectations and stresses only hurts the children, this affects the children getting help later in life and making it harder for them to break the cycle.
Another common theme in South Asian households is the idea of collectivism. This means that individual desires are put second to family desires. Collectivism can be especially toxic, because someone pursuing their own needs and desires are essential to their development as a human. An example of collectivism within a South Asian family is the idea that the children in a South Asian family will have to look after the elderly when the children are older. This leaves less time to pursue personal needs and places large amounts of emotional stress on the children (Health 7). As mentioned before, emotional stresses negatively impact a child's development. What makes this especially worse is the fact that these children have less time to address this emotional stress due to the needs of the family. This lessens the amount of South Asian youth looking for mental health help; they're so busy with their family needs, they have no time to focus on their own. Another way collectivism manifests into toxicity is through marriage. In a majority of South Asian households, marriages between a bride and a groom are arranged by the families. In fact, approximately 90% of all marriages in South Asia are arranged (Nayak 4). The bride or groom's family find another bride or groom to marry and contact their families to unionize their children. In the South Asian world, many of the children have already accepted their fate. However, due to western influences and the idea of love marriages, many first-generation South Asian children have decided that they want to marry someone they choose instead of someone their family chooses. Of course, South Asian parents do not approve of these types of marriages. Often, South Asian youth will hide their romantic relationships from their parents because they know that their parents will not approve of it. This can manifest into habits of secrecy and bouts of anxiety (Ahmed 8). South Asians in the LGBT community are especially affected, since the stigma around the LGBT community in South Asian culture is largely negative (Bhat 2). Due to this stigma, many LGBT South Asian youth find themselves shutting down their personal desires in place of their family's desires. This can lead to repressed emotions and desires which can manifest themselves negatively (Health 8). And according to a 2021 study on LGBT youth mental health, 51% of Asian/Pacific Islander LGBT youth wanted mental health counseling, but didn't receive it (The Trevor Project). This suggests the negative stigma is very intense, so many don't come forward about it due to the fear of disapproving their parents. The two cases of arranged marriages and the disapproval of the LGBT community go to show the toxicity of collectivism and how it affects South Asian youth seeking mental health help.
Another barrier in seeking mental health care is finances. Many South Asian immigrants simply do not have the finances to afford or maintain mental health care. To put into perspective, an already significant percentage of South Asians live at or below the poverty line. One third of these South Asians are children (Demographic Characteristics of South Asians in the United States p. 3). And generally, therapy costs around $100-200 per session with coverage. Therapy is even more expensive in rural areas, where many people of color live (Murray 6). This is an especially tough thing to face because even if South Asian parents remove their stigma and bias toward mental health care, the simple act of not being able to afford mental health care throws all of that down the drain. A 2022 study listed in the Journal of Psychosocial Nursing and Mental Health Services examined the barriers that South Asian college students face when seeking mental health care. Many of the participants in the study named barriers such as family influence, outside environment, and cultural dynamics. However, many college students also listed affordability. One participant in particular explained their reasoning why seeking help is so hard: "Most participants reported cost of care as the greatest determinant for seeking mental health care: I would say more the technicalities of health insurance and financial ability [have prevented me] to seek help, just because it's usually not covered in regular insurances or just that I haven't had the financial ability to even have health insurance, so it wasn't something that was on the priorities list, I guess. (Participant 5)" (Tamanna 19). As explained in the testimony, the finances and technicalities of health care got in the way of a young South Asian student getting mental health care. This factor can also apply to all groups, not just South Asians. Mental health care is becoming increasingly expensive, limiting the amount of people who can gain access to it. For the sake of this research, however, South Asian students are especially at risk to suffer.
All in all, the ability for South Asian youth is negatively impacted due to high expectations and familial stresses, toxic collectivism, and the inability to afford mental health care. The inability of many South Asian youth to get mental health care can turn into a vicious cycle for the next generation. Scars inflicted from childhood will project onto their children, and so on. If the cycle does not break at some point, the future generations of South Asians can be considered compromised. These findings highlight the need for action to increase availability of mental health care to South Asian youth as well as education for South Asian parents on the impacts of mental health. As time continues to pass, one can only hope the next generation takes a step in the right direction. In regards to mental health, the time to take a step in the right direction is now.
Works Cited in MLA