SES and neighborhood characteristics often confound the association between race/ethnicity and psychiatric problems. We investigate differences in depression among people from two adjacent census tracts that differed by race but had similar levels of poverty, income, and education. Restricting the sample to these two census tracts allows studying possible race disparities with a sharpened focus, because many potential confounders are held constant.

The Community Health Urban Project (CHUP) is a survey carried out with a sample of adults ages 18 and above, living in two SES adjacent census tracts in a mid-size metropolitan area in the mid-Atlantic region of the United States of America. A total of 1,425 adults were interviewed using standardized measures and provided information that was useful for the present analyses. GEE models were used to accommodate interdependence of observations by household.

One in 10 participants had symptoms of depression. Compared to Blacks, whites had higher depression prevalence (7.5% vs. 13.3%). Participants who had smoked in the past year had a higher odds of depression (OR=3.0; 95% CI, 1.5, 5.8 for whites, and OR=2.1, 95% CI=1.1, 4,1 for Blacks) controlling for gender, age, education, working status, and seeking health care in the past two years. Comment. In spite of overall racial/ethnic differences in rates of depression, tobacco users had higher odds of depression, regardless of race. Acknowledgements: Grants 5P60MD000217 (National Center for Minority Health and Health Disparities), 5R24DA019805 (National Institute on Drug Abuse), and Pfizer, Inc.