Investigation of Socio-Demographic Factors on Mental Health of Women in lbadan Metropolis

Abstract

 Mental health problems are very rampant among women nowadays because of family stress and lack of adequate protection for women due to certain cultural and religious practices. Mental health problems encompass aggression, depression, suicide intention, loneliness and mental illness. Many studies have identified various socio-demographic factors as predictors of mental health of women but sufficient studies have not been cited to have been conducted in Ibadan. Therefore, this study investigated socio-demographic factors on mental health problems of women in Ibadan.  Descriptive research design of correlation type was adopted for the study and the purposive sampling technique was deployed to select 250 women who reported mental health issues of depression, and anxiety as a result of their marital relationships with average age of 40.7 years. A structured questionnaire on Mental Health Scale (r=0.78) was used to collect data from the respondent. Multiple regression and Pearson product moment were used for data analysis. The results show that there is joint contribution between the independent variables: age, marital duration, family type, and nature of marriage and the dependent variable (mental health of women) (F (4, 184) = 5.02; Adj R² = 0.079; p < 0.05_.001) and accounted for 8% of prediction and  in the relative contribution, family type (β = 0.168; t = 2.341; p < 0.05 made the most contribution to mental health problems  of women  followed by nature of marriage (β =0.214; t = 2.974; p < 0.05) while age (β = 0.057; t = 0.771; p > 0.05 and marital duration (β =0.092; t = 1.253; p > 0.05) did not contribute to mental health problems of women. It is recommended that stakeholders such as marriage counsellors, health workers and social workers and ministry of women affairs should push for more aggressive counselling on how to reduce mental health problem among women in our society.

Keywords: Socio-demographical factors, mental health, women in Ibadan.