Residential churn moderates the relationship between economic deprivation and psychiatric admission: evidence from Wales.

BACKGROUND: There is a well-established link between area-level socioeconomic deprivation and psychiatric admission rates. Social capital has been proposed as a possible protective factor that may buffer economically deprived communities, but it may be disrupted in areas with high population turnover. This study aims to test whether population turnover, hereafter called churn, moderates the social gradient of psychiatric admissions. METHODS: Population churn rates, low income rates and psychiatric admission rates for 1909 lower super output areas in Wales were analysed using Poisson generalised linear mixed-effects models. Additional analyses explored the impact of deprivation measured more generally and the potential confound of population density. RESULTS: Population churn moderated the association between socioeconomic deprivation and psychiatric admission rates, such that greater social gradients in admission rates were found in areas with greater churn. Economic deprivation and churn were also found to be independently positively associated with admission rates. These relationships remained significant when using a broader measure of deprivation and after adjusting for population density. CONCLUSION: High churn appears to exacerbate the detrimental effects of economic deprivation on mental health as well as being a risk factor in its own right. Residential stability rates should be considered when designing and implementing policies which aim to understand, prevent and treat mental health problems in at-risk communities.

Is trivialisation of alcohol consumption a laughing matter? Alcohol incidence in a metropolitan daily newspaper's comic strips.

INTRODUCTION AND AIMS: A number of studies have looked at the incidence and nature of depictions of alcohol in various media, primarily in movies, television and magazines. However, there have been few studies of depictions of alcohol in comic strips in newspapers. DESIGN AND METHODS: This study analysed the content of the five comic strips in the 258 weekday editions of a metropolitan newspaper over a period of 1 year. Where alcohol was depicted, this was classified as either integral or incidental to the theme or story of that day's strip. As an indication of the nature of the depiction and in the absence of specific codes for the depiction of alcohol in comic strips, depictions were assessed against the Australian Alcoholic Beverages Advertising Code (ABAC). RESULTS: Of the 1 290 individual comic strips, 4% (n = 54) depicted alcohol. Depictions were equal in number incidental and integral to the 'story'. Over half of the strips depicting alcohol were deemed to breach the ABAC, with the most common breach related to trivialisation of alcohol consumption. One strip accounted for over 60% of all depictions with the majority breaching the ABAC. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest that newspaper publishers should consider a code for depictions of alcohol (and other unhealthy or risky products/behaviours) in comics. At the very least, comics that trivialise the abuse of alcohol should be excluded under such a code.