By: Elmer Garcia and Lindsey Rodriguez

Edit by: Jocelyn Carranza

Racism has taken its toll on minorities but there is a side of racism that people do not talk about. That is how racism affects minorities mental health, especially when it comes to developing schizophrenia. Mental health is a complex and incendiary topic to understand therefore it comes to no surprise that many may overlook this point of view of  racism. Although, it is rare they’re studies that determine how racism has affected the brain. According to an article by the American Psychological Association, one of the findings made by scientists highlights that due to racism minorities have a higher chance of being diagnosed with certain mental disorders. The article states, “Perceived discrimination has been shown to contribute to mental health disorders among racial/ethnic groups such as Asian Americans and African Americans (Jang, Chiriboga, Kim, & Rhew, 2010; Mezuk et al., 2010).” This suggest that compared with Whites, African-Americans are more frequently diagnosed with schizophrenia, a low-prevalence but serious condition (McGuire & Miranda, 2008).” This helps draw the conclusion that because racism has been a stresser on minorities that is has caused them to develop a certain disorders such as schizophrenia. People may discard this because they see no clear ties between the two and there is no clear cause for the disorder. However, if one digs deeper into what studies show on what might cause the disorder they claim that it has to do with the persons environment or emotional trigger.  According to the NHS (National Health Service) UK they have compiled a list that explain what their research has determined what may cause or trigger schizophrenia.  According to US national Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health, they claim that racism has some correlation with causing low self esteem. They wrote,” In analysing this within a social model of depression indicating a few ways in which racism subtly – and not so subtly – affects self esteem, causes losses in a psychological sense, and promotes a sense of helplessness.” Studies that have to do with oppression and depression are far and scarce. Because of this only few ways have been discovered on how it causes depression but there are things that are certain. For example, depression can lower self esteem this varies from person to person some only affected a little while others might suffer from a more rooted causing the person to have an extremely low self esteem. Oppression can also lead to the person feeling helplessness again this may vary on the person but there is a clear role that oppression plays whether it be large or small. It can also cause a loss of psychological which can get worse as it continues to happen. This has to do with the development of schizophrenia because low self esteem and depression cause a great deal of stress and are considered emotional abuse. Both these qualify as an emotional trigger/abuse and after years or even decades of dealing with these the brain is more vulnerable into developing schizophrenia.