Strong Black Women? Investigating the role of intersectionality in the experience, treatment, and outcomes of common mental disorders among Black

常见精神障碍（CMD），包括抑郁和焦虑，是一个主要的全球精神卫生问题。在英国，女性患CMD的比例不成比例（女性占19%，男性占12%），种族因素也增加了额外的劣势，英国黑人/黑人女性患CMD的比例高于英国白人女性（29.3%对20.9%）。尽管患病率上升，但黑人/黑人英国妇女寻求和接受治疗的可能性较小，而且更有可能经历不良结果（例如，适应不良的应对方式，根据《精神卫生法》被拘留）。了解和解决这些精神卫生不平等现象对于确保社会所有成员都能获得和获得健康所需的支持至关重要。根据一般的交叉性框架，特别是坚强的黑人女性图式，拟议的研究将调查性别和种族如何以及为什么可能共同影响黑人女性（例如，英国黑人女性；非洲黑人和加勒比黑人背景的女性）与CMD相关的经历、治疗和结果。通过对文献的系统回顾、焦点小组、国际横断面调查和深入访谈，我们将测试关于黑人和女性的信仰和期望是否会影响CMD的经历，以及这些交叉点是否反过来影响治疗和结果。研究结果将为黑人女性CMD患者的生活经历提供重要见解，并帮助我们确定治疗障碍和不良结果的预测因素。这项研究将与Catalyst 4Change（伯明翰）和BlackThrive（伦敦）合作进行，这两个组织致力于发展和支持英国黑人、非洲人和加勒比人的心理健康和福祉。我们的合作伙伴将通过将我们与一系列利益相关者（即从业人员、有生活经验的人、政策制定者）联系起来，组成一个研究咨询委员会，帮助我们将这项研究嵌入社区。我们的合作伙伴还将支持我们招募参与者的主要研究活动，通过与我们合作，将研究结果转化为向专员和服务提供者提供合适的建议，将我们与社区中的黑人妇女联系起来，并进行传播。这项工作还将更广泛地增加关于交叉性的文献，为其在心理健康中的作用提供重要的定性和定量数据。

Common mental disorders (CMD), which include depression and anxiety, are a major global mental health concern. In Britain, women are disproportionally affected by CMD (19% women versus 12% men) and ethnicity adds an additional layer of disadvantage, with Black/Black British women experiencing higher rates of CMD relative to White British women (29.3% versus 20.9%). Despite this increased prevalence, Black/Black British women are less likely to seek and receive treatment, and more likely to experience poor outcomes (e.g., maladaptive coping, detention under the Mental Health Act). Understanding and addressing these mental health inequalities are imperative to ensuring that all members of society can access and obtain the support needed to fare well. Drawing on the framework of intersectionality in general, and the Strong Black woman schema in particular, the proposed research will investigate how and why gender and race might work together to shape the experience, treatment and outcomes associated with CMD among Black women (e.g., Black British women; women with Black-African and Black-Caribbean backgrounds). Through a systematic review of the literature, focus groups, an international cross-sectional survey, and in-depth interviews we will test whether beliefs and expectations about being what it means to be Black and female shape the experience of CMD, and whether these intersections, in turn, influence treatment and outcomes. Findings will provide important insights into the lived experiences of Black women with CMD as well as helping us to identify barriers to treatment and predictors of poor outcomes. This research will be conducted in partnership with Catalyst 4Change (Birmingham) and BlackThrive (London), organisations that work to develop and support Black British, African and Caribbean mental health and well-being in the United Kingdom. Our partners will help us to embed this research in the community, by connecting us with a range of stakeholders (i.e., practitioners, people with lived experiences, policymakers) to form a research advisory board. Our partners will also support our main research activities of participant recruitment, connecting us with Black women from the community with CMD, and with dissemination, by working with us to translate and findings into suitable recommendations for commissioners and service providers. This work will also add to the literature on intersectionality more broadly, providing important qualitative and quantitative data on its roles in mental health.