Megan C. Lytle

Social structure and depression in TrevorSpace

We discover patterns related to depression in the social graph of an online community of approximately 20,000 lesbian, gay, and bisexual, transgender, and questioning youth. With survey data on fewer than two hundred community members and the network graph of the entire community (which is completely anonymous except for the survey responses), we detected statistically significant correlations between a number of graph properties and those TrevorSpace users showing a higher likelihood of depression, according to the Patient Healthcare Questionnaire-9, a standard instrument for estimating depression. Our results suggest that those who are less depressed are more deeply integrated into the social fabric of TrevorSpace than those who are more depressed. Our techniques may apply to other hard-to-reach online communities, like gay men on Facebook, where obtaining detailed information about individuals is difficult or expensive, but obtaining the social graph is not.

Toward Macro-Insights for Suicide Prevention: Analyzing Fine-Grained Distress at Scale

Suicide is a leading cause of death in the United States. One of the major challenges to suicide prevention is that those who may be most at risk cannot be relied upon to report their conditions to clinicians. This paper takes an initial step toward the automatic detection of suicidal risk factors through social media activity, with no reliance on self-reporting. We consider the performance of annotators with various degrees of expertise in suicide prevention at annotating microblog data for the purpose of training text-based models for detecting suicide risk behaviors. Consistent with crowdsourcing literature, we found that novice-novice annotator pairs underperform expert annotators and outperform automatic lexical analysis tools, such as Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count.

Current Trends in Retirement: Implications for Career Counseling and Vocational Psychology.

This article provides an overview of emerging trends in retirement, examines demographic trends in the labor force, and provides practical recommendations for working with older workers across cultures (e.g., women and racial/ethnic minorities, and among others). Increasingly, older workers in the United States remain in the workforce for reasons related to financial security, health care, and personal fulfillment. Although retirement trends have become more complex, there is limited empirical literature addressing this issue and the research available does not attend to the needs of a diverse workforce. Therefore, implications for training, practice, advocacy, and research with regard to working with older workers across cultures (e.g., women and racial/ethnic minorities, among others) are provided.

Career and Retirement Theories: Relevance for Older Workers Across Cultures

This article reviews selected career development theories and theories specifically focused on retirement, with an emphasis on their application to retirement decisions and vocational behavior in multicultural populations. Theories are evaluated based on whether (a) retirement was considered a stage of working life, (b) work satisfaction, motivation, and other work variables at retirement age were addressed, (c) work choices at retirement age were included, and (d) cultural and other minority status issues were either directly considered in the work–retirement decision or if the model could be reasonably applied to retirement across cultures. We provide specific recommendations for research and practice with the aim of helping practitioners and scholars conceptualize the current concerns older adults face in their working lives and during retirement planning.

The associations of race/ethnicity and suicidal ideation among college students: a latent class analysis examining precipitating events and disclosure patterns

The aim of this paper was to examine precipitating events for suicidal ideation and how these experiences relate to disclosure in a diverse sample of college students were examined. Among non-Hispanic White students, relationship/academic problems were most associated with ideation. A romantic break-up increased the odds of getting help. Among racial/ethnic minority students, family/academic problems were most associated with ideation and students who reported multiple events were less likely to get help compared with those not reporting events. Future research should examine the reasons for interpersonal conflict among this high-risk group and their attitudes about help-seeking, and identify cultural norms associated with disclosure.

Mindfulness-based stress reduction to enhance psychological functioning and improve inflammatory biomarkers in trauma-exposed women: A pilot study.

This study examined the effects of a mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) program on psychological functioning and inflammatory biomarkers in women with histories of interpersonal trauma. The 8-week MBSR program was conducted at a community-based health center and participants (N = 50) completed several measures of psychological functioning at study entry as well as 4 weeks, 8 weeks, and 12 weeks later. Inflammatory biomarkers were assayed from blood collected at each assessment. A series of linear mixed-model analyses were conducted to measure the effect of attendance and time on the dependent variables. Time was associated with significant decreases in perceived stress, depression, trait and state anxiety, emotion dysregulation, and posttraumatic stress symptoms, as well as increases in mindfulness. Session attendance was associated with significant decreases in interleukin (IL)-6 levels. This pilot study demonstrated the potential beneficial effects of MBSR on psychological functioning and the inflammatory biomarker IL-6 among trauma-exposed and primarily low-income women. Decreases in inflammation have implications for this population, as interpersonal trauma can instigate chronic physiological dysregulation, heightened morbidity, and premature death. This studys preliminary results support efforts to investigate biological remediation with behavioral interventions in vulnerable populations.

Exploring the Intersectionality of Bisexual, Religious/Spiritual, and Political Identities From a Feminist Perspective

Although there is a growing body of work that examines the religious/spiritual lives of bisexuals, additional research that further explores the intersectionality of these distinct identities is needed. Motivated by the feminist notions that the personal is political and individuals are experts of their own experiences, the aim of this study is to better understand intersecting identities experienced by bisexuals. Data from the Northern California Health Study was used to examine the intersection of bisexual, religious/spiritual, and political identities. Results suggest that higher lesbian, gay, and bisexual self-esteem scores and openness about sexual orientation correlate with higher levels of spirituality. Further, attraction to same-sex partners was associated with perceiving sexual orientation as a choice, identifying as bisexual at a younger age, an increased likeliness to come out, being less likely to view religion as socially important, and a higher belief statement score. The authors discuss the implications of these results.

Associations of racial/ethnic identities and religious affiliation with suicidal ideation among lesbian, gay, bisexual, and questioning individuals.

BACKGROUND Our aim was to examine the associations of racial/ethnic identity and religious affiliation with suicidal ideation among lesbian, gay, bisexual, and questioning (LGBQ) and heterosexual college students. An additional aim was to determine the prevalence of passive suicidal ideation (i.e., death ideation) and active suicidal ideation among culturally diverse LGBQ individuals. METHODS Data from the National Research Consortium probability-based sample of college students from 70 postsecondary institutions (n=24,626) were used to examine active and passive suicidal ideation in the past 12-months and lifetime active suicidal ideation among students by sexual orientation, racial/ethnic identity, and religious affiliation. RESULTS Across most racial/ethnic groups and religious affiliations, LGBQ students were more likely to report active suicidal ideation than non-LGBQ individuals. Among LGBQ students, Latino individuals had lower odds of reporting both past 12-month passive and active suicidal ideation than their non-Hispanic white LGBQ counterparts. Compared to Christian LGBQ students, Agnostic/Atheist LGBQ individuals had greater odds of reporting past 12-month passive suicidal ideation, and Jewish LGBQ students were less likely to endorse past 12-month passive and active suicidal ideation. LIMITATIONS Cross-sectional design and self-reported data. CONCLUSIONS Results corroborate previous research showing elevated prevalence of suicidal ideation among LGBQ individuals in comparison to their heterosexual counterparts. These findings are among the first to document prevalence differences within the LGBQ population based on intersectional identities (race/ethnicity and religious affiliation). Providers should recognize that LGBQ individuals might need support in negotiating the complex relationship between multiple identities, especially due to their elevated prevalence of suicidal ideation.

The Association of Multiple Identities with Self-Directed Violence and Depression among Transgender Individuals.

Transgender individuals have a high prevalence of self-directed violence; however, there is scant literature focusing on their unique experiences. The differences in self-harm, suicidal ideation, suicide attempt, and depression based on racial/ethnic identity and sexual orientation were examined among transgender individuals. Data were gathered from the Fall 2008 and Spring 2009 National College Health Assessment. Across racial/ethnic identities, greater proportions of transgender students endorsed self-directed violence than their cisgender peers. Among transgender individuals, sexual minorities were more likely to report suicidal ideation than their heterosexual peers, and racial/ethnic minorities had higher odds of attempting suicide than non-Hispanic White individuals.

Cigarette smoking disparities among sexual minority cancer survivors

Objective Sexual minority (i.e., lesbian, gay, and bisexual) adults smoke cigarettes at higher rates than heterosexual adults. Smoking after receiving a cancer diagnosis is a major health concern, yet risk of continued smoking among sexual minority cancer survivors is as yet unknown. The current study examines current smoking among sexual minority vs. heterosexual adult cancer survivors. Method Data drawn from the 2010 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System survey in five states (Alaska, California, Massachusetts, New Mexico, and Wisconsin) included items about sexual orientation, cancer diagnosis, and tobacco use. The analytic sample included 124 sexual minority and 248 propensity score matched heterosexual adult cancer survivors. Results Bivariate analysis showed that sexual minority cancer survivors had twice the odds of current smoking as their heterosexual counterparts (OR = 2.03, 95%CI:1.09–3.80). In exploratory analyses stratified by sex, sexual minority disparities in prevalence of smoking post-cancer showed a trend toward significance among females, not males. Conclusion The current study offers preliminary evidence that sexual minority status is one variable among many that must be taken into account when assessing health behaviors post-cancer diagnosis. Future research should identify mechanisms leading from sexual minority status to increased rates of smoking and develop tailored smoking cessation interventions.