The 2023 World Mental Health Report produced by Sapiens Lab and released on March 4, 2024 shows that the mentally healthiest country, that is, the country with the highest Mental Health Quotient [MHQ] is Dominican Republic with a total score of 91.
Next is Sri Lanka (89 points). Of the 71 countries studied, Nigeria emerged No 6 -meaning that Nigerians are far mentally healthier than citizens of USA, UAE, UK, Australia, the Netherlands, Belgium and France, for examples.
Nigeria’s MHQ score at 83 is 5 points higher than what she scored in 2022.
The country with the lowest Mental Health Quotient is Uzbekistan with 48 point.
The greatest surprise is that the second poorest country is the United Kingdom with 49, followed by South Africa with 50 score.
Alarmingly, the report which said in 2022 that “The percentage of the 18-24 age group Distressed or Struggling was three to five times higher than in the 55-64 age group across all regions and language groups”, said in the 2023 report that the trend remains the same!
It said, “The age at which children first own a smartphone, and the way this consequently opens up their world to the internet and social media, therefore seems to be a key factor in declining mental wellbeing trends“
Increase in the Consumption of processed food has worsened matters, mostly in developed countries, it said. It also said rha
Methodological reference:
(i) The quotient was based on 6 constructs/dimensions: (1) Cognition (2) Adaptability & Resilience, (3) Drive & Motivation, (4) Mood & Outlook, (5) Social Self, (6) Mind body Connection
Below are some highlights in the report. The link is shared below for further reading.
Executive Summary
This Mental State of the World Report is the annual report of the Global Mind Project and provides trends and insights on the mental wellbeing of Internet-enabled populations around the globe.
In 2023, we collected data from over 500,000 respondents in 13 languages across 71 countries that spanned 9 regions.
Data is collected using the MHQ assessment, a comprehensive online survey of cognitive and emotional capabilities that provides an overall mental wellbeing metric (the MHQ
score) as well as multiple dimensional views that relate to the ability to navigate the normal stresses
of life and function productively.
Key insights this year are as follows:
• Mental wellbeing remained at its post-pandemic low with yet again no sign of movement towards pre-pandemic levels.
In 2023, at both a global level and at the level of individual countries, MHQ scores remained largely unchanged relative to 2021 and 2022, after a sharp drop during the pandemic years.
This raises important questions about the lasting impact of the pandemic, and how shifts in the way we live and work and the amplification of existing habits
(e.g. remote working, online communication, consumption of ultra-processed food, use of single use plastics) have cumulatively pushed us into a space of poorer mental wellbeing.
• Younger generations, particularly those under age 35, saw the steepest declines in mental wellbeing during the Covid-19 pandemic while those over 65 stayed steady.
With these declines persisting across all age groups, the pandemic amplified a pre-existing trend of poorer mental
wellbeing for younger generations that is now visible across the globe.
• As in previous years, several African and Latin American countries topped the country rankings, while wealthier countries of the Core Anglosphere such as the United Kingdom and Australia are towards the bottom. This pattern suggests that greater wealth and economic development do not necessarily lead to greater mental wellbeing.
In 2023, data from the Global Mind Project identified key factors that explain these patterns, such as getting a smartphone at a young age, frequently eating ultra-processed food and a fraying of friendships and family relationships, that are typically more prevalent in Internet-enabled populations of wealthier countries.
Overall, the insights in this report paint a worrying picture of our post-pandemic prospects and we urgently need to better understand the drivers of our collective mental wellbeing such that we can align our ambitious and goals with the genuine prosperity of human beings.
Introduction
Countries and regions that form part of the 2023 report North America Eastern Europe and Central Asia
(Russian-speaking)
Armenia*, Azerbaijan*, Belarus* ,
Georgia*, Kazakhstan*, Kyrgyzstan*,
Republic of Moldova*, Tajikistan*,
Ukraine, Uzbekistan*
Western Europe:
Belgium, France,
Germany, Ireland,
Italy, Portugal, Spain,
United Kingdom
South Asia
Oceania
South-East Asia:
Australia,
New Zealand
Malaysia,
Philippines,
Singapore
Latin America and Caribbean:
Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador,
Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, Venezuela
Sub-Saharan Africa:
Angola, Cameroon, Cote
d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic
of Congo, Kenya, Mozambique,
Nigeria, South Africa, Sudan*,
Tanzania, Zimbabwe
Canada, United States
Middle East and North Africa:
Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Israel*
Jordan, Morocco, Saudi
Arabia, Syria*, Tunisia, United
Arab Emirates, Yemen
Bangladesh, India,
Pakistan, Sri Lanka
* Countries with under 1000 respondents
What’s in this report
In this report we highlight mental wellbeing trends over time as well as the relative mental wellbeing of 71 countries.
Explaining the rankings of countries
With mental wellbeing remaining steady across almost all countries since 2021, the rankings too have remained relatively steady.
Only 5 countries moved up the mental wellbeing scale by 2% or more while 4
moved down by 2% or more. As seen each year, countries at the top of the list are largely Latin American and African countries such as Tanzania, Nigeria, Venezuela, and the Dominican Republic, while the wealthier countries of the Core Anglosphere such as the United Kingdom and Australia are towards the bottom.
This runs counter to our common perception that wealth enhances wellbeing.
In our annual report for 2021 we showed that the average mental wellbeing scores of the Internet-enabled populations of countries were strongly and significantly negatively correlated with economic metrics such as per capita GDP and even the Human Development Index. Why is this so?
In 2023 we have begun to make progress towards answering this question. You can read more details in our published Rapid Reports but here are 3 key findings of particular significance and concern.
The first relates to the age at which a child gets their first smartphone. Across a sample of 27,969 respondents, we found that for today’s 18-24 year olds, who are the first generation to be born into a world of smartphones and social media, the younger they were when they got their first smartphone the worse their mental health outcomes in adulthood.
For example, 74% of female respondents aged 18-24 who got their first smartphone at age 6 had MHQ scores that fell within a Distressed or Struggling range. This decreased to 61% for those who acquired their first smartphone at age 10, and 52% for those who acquired their first smartphone at age 15. The impacts of owning a smartphone at a young age were especially pronounced for the dimension of Social Self and drove symptoms such as Suicidal thoughts, Feeling detached from reality and Feelings of aggression towards others. In countries that are generally at the top of the list in this report, and less developed countries in general, the average age that young people first own a smartphone is typically older (about 14/15 in Latin America and 16 in Sub-Saharan Africa) while it’s lowest in the Core Anglosphere (age 11).
The age at which children first own a smartphone, and the way this consequently opens up their world to the internet and social media, therefore seems to be a key factor in declining mental wellbeing trends.
A second finding relates to the consumption of ultra-processed food. In this Rapid Report published earlier this year, based on a sample of 292,786 respondents, we showed that more frequent consumption of ultra-processed food results in substantially poorer mental wellbeing at all ages, with a broad impact on symptoms of depression and emotional and cognitive control.
For example, we found that over half of those who eat ultra-processed food daily are Distressed or Struggling with their mental wellbeing, compared to just 18% of those who rarely or never consume ultra- processed food, an almost 3-fold increase. Similar to with the age of smartphone ownership, less developed countries tend to have lower ultra-processed food consumption while 60-70% of food consumption in Core Anglosphere countries like the United States and United Kingdom are ultra-processed 9,10.
A third factor discussed in our report last year are diminished family bonds. For example, across a sample of 407,959 respondents, we found that 10% of 18-24 year olds did not get along with any of their family and preferred not to see them compared to only 3% of the oldest generation. At the same time, the risk of mental health challenges in adulthood are four times lower if you have close family relationships.
Direct link to the report: https://sapienlabs.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/4th-Annual-Mental-State-of-the-World-Report.pdf
