New research published in Sociological Forum suggests that participating in identity politics tends to be associated with lower levels of mental well-being among political progressives. The findings indicate that focusing on social identity and collective protest might explain why progressive individuals report more depression and anxiety than their conservative peers.
Over the past decade, scientists have observed a growing mental health gap between people with different political ideologies. Specifically, data provides evidence that progressives generally report lower mental well-being than conservatives. George Yancey, a professor of sociology at Baylor University, wanted to explore the reasons behind this expanding divide.
The inspiration for the study originated outside of the academic sphere. “I was doing some consulting work and asked by a lawyer about possible detrimental effects of antiracism training on the participants in the program,” Yancey explained. “I have previously studied the relative lack of effectiveness of those programs as it concerns attitudinal change but had not considered whether they, and the identity politics that motivate them, may lower well-being.”
This thought process coincided with emerging data on psychological health. “When I saw research showing the decline of well-being among the young starting about 10 years ago, my interest was piqued even more,” Yancey noted. “When I saw the data in the Baylor Religion Survey, I recognized that I could test out hypotheses about the possible relationship of adherence to identity politics and well-being.”
The gap in mental health widened notably around 2012. This period coincided with a cultural shift sometimes referred to as the Great Awokening, which describes a time when public attention heavily shifted toward systemic oppression and the struggles of marginalized groups.
Yancey noticed that this cultural shift heavily emphasized identity politics. Identity politics is a political approach where people form alliances and prioritize activism based on their shared social identity, such as race, gender, or sexual orientation. He designed this study to test if focusing on these identity-based issues might be connected to the declining well-being of politically progressive individuals.
To investigate these questions, the researcher analyzed data from the 2021 Baylor Religion Survey. This survey provided a representative sample of adults in the United States. The initial sample included 1,336 individuals. The data was mathematically weighted to adjust for nonresponse, resulting in a final group of 1,248 respondents.
The survey asked participants a variety of questions to measure their mental well-being. Participants rated their feelings of depression, which included indicating how often they felt sad or down. They also rated their anxiety by indicating how often they felt worried, tense, or restless.
Finally, the survey measured the participants’ sense of personal control over their lives. Sense of control refers to how much individuals believe they can solve their own problems rather than feeling completely helpless. All of these individual responses were combined to create self-assessed scores for depression, anxiety, and personal control.
To measure political beliefs, respondents rated their overall political orientation on a scale ranging from highly conservative to highly progressive. The survey also included specific questions to gauge engagement with identity politics. One variable asked about a person’s willingness to participate in political protests specifically intended to address racial inequality.
Another question asked if respondents believed the government should enact stronger laws protecting the rights of sexual minorities. To provide a comparison to identity politics, the researcher also measured class-based progressive views. This was done by creating an index of questions asking if the government should provide public goods like health care and free college tuition.
Using statistical models, the researcher examined how these different political views related to mental health. The initial calculations showed a consistent pattern in the data. General progressive political beliefs were strongly linked to lower well-being across depression, anxiety, and sense of control.
Introducing the specific identity politics measurements completely changed the mathematical relationship. The researcher found that participating in racial inequality protests and supporting sexual minority protections explained the lower well-being scores. In statistical terms, this effect is known as mediation.
Mediation happens when a specific factor completely accounts for the relationship between two other variables. In this study, general progressive ideology only predicted depression and a lower sense of control because it was tied to identity politics. Once the researcher factored in the identity politics variables, the general link between being progressive and feeling depressed or helpless vanished.
When looking specifically at anxiety, the identity politics measures did not completely erase the connection between progressive views and lower well-being, though they accounted for a very large portion of the relationship. Yancey pointed out that the findings aligned with his initial expectations. “Not really surprising,” he said. “I went into the research considering if the growth of identity politics may have contributed to the recent decline of well-being, and this research suggests that it is a possibility.”
The same effect did not happen with the class-based political measures. Desiring higher government spending for health care and college did not explain the well-being gap. This suggests that people who hold progressive economic views but avoid identity politics tend to have mental health levels similar to the rest of the population.
To ensure the findings were robust, the researcher also ran an additional analysis using a mathematical technique to account for missing survey responses. This increased the sample size for the models to 1,131 individuals. The results remained consistent, strengthening the evidence that identity politics variables largely account for the lower well-being reported by political progressives.
The researcher suggests that identity politics requires constant attention to systemic injustice. This focus on external societal forces that an individual cannot easily change tends to lower their internal locus of control. Locus of control is a psychological concept describing how much power people feel they have over the events in their own lives.
While the study provides evidence of a link between identity politics and lower well-being, Yancey notes that the survey data was collected at a single point in time, meaning the direction of the effect remains unknown. “I am not making a causal assertion since directionality cannot be determined with static survey data,” Yancey said. “But there appears to be a relationship between identity politics and well-being.”
“Whether it is that identity politics attracts individuals with low levels of well-being or adherence to identity politics reduces well-being, we need to include in the calculation of promoting identity politics the possibility that those active in it have lower well-being,” Yancey explained. “Identity politics may bring an additional cost of either promoting a system that caters to lower well-being or creating lower well-being itself.”
The researcher wants to ensure the public does not view these results as absolute proof of psychological harm. “I am not claiming that we know that identity politics leads to lower well-being,” Yancey noted. “Ideally, longitudinal or experimental research can arise to answer that question. Readers should know that all I have done is document an association of identity politics and lower well-being.”
Future studies will be needed to track individuals over several years to see if adopting identity politics precedes a decline in mental health. “If I can find the funding, I would love to investigate whether there is a causal relationship with an experimental design on the impacts of the adaptation of identity politics,” Yancey said. “With enough funding, it would be possible to explore this with longitudinal analysis as well.”
The study, “Identity Politics, Political Ideology, and Well-being: Is Identity Politics Good for Our Well-being?,” was authored by George Yancey.
