How was cultural efficacy linked to anxiety and positive mental health?

Details

Researchers used a novel measure of cultural efficacy to examine pathways between enculturation, efficacy, and two wellbeing outcomes. Although these processes are widely understood in Indigenous communities, academic literature has not consistently linked cultural factors to better wellbeing.

Healing Pathways is a community-based participatory study involving eight reservations/reserves in the upper Midwest and Canada. This analysis used data collected in 2017–2018 from 453 participants, 58.1% of whom were women, with a mean age of 26.3 years. Researchers used structural equation modeling to test relationships among enculturation, cultural efficacy, and mental health.

The direct effect of enculturation on anxiety was positive. The indirect effect through cultural efficacy was negatively associated with anxiety and positively associated with positive mental health. The researchers concluded that cultural efficacy is an important linking variable through which culture’s protective effects manifest. They said that fully capturing culture’s protective role requires innovative measures and a deep understanding of Indigenous peoples, given the complexity of culture.