Symptoms of Depression and Anxiety: Demographic Variations Across 22 Countries in the Global Flourishing Study

Background: We know relatively little about how mental health varies: (a) across countries around the world; or (b) among demographic groups in diverse nations and cultures. Methods: The current study addresses these issues by analyzing symptoms of depression and anxiety using data from the Global Flourishing Study (GFS), an international survey of 202,898 individuals from 22 geographically, economically, and culturally diverse countries collected in 2022-2023. Results: Proportions of individuals with substantial symptoms of depression ranged from 0.14 in Poland to 0.50 in the Philippines. These two countries reported the lowest and highest substantial symptoms of anxiety as well (0.13 and 0.48, respectively). Economically developing, non-Western countries tended to have higher proportions on both outcomes compared with developed, predominantly Western nations. Symptoms of depression and anxiety also varied across age, gender, marital status, education, employment status, religious service attendance, and immigration status in one or more countries. The results of random effects meta-analyses showed that several demographic factors were significant predictors of both outcome variables when the results for all 22 countries were pooled. Conclusion: While being mindful of varying cultural contexts and possible translation and interpretive issues with the survey questions, the results do suggest substantial variations in symptoms of both depression and anxiety across nations and key demographic groups. This work lays the foundation for future longitudinal GFS studies of mental health from a cross-national and global perspective.