Don’t care what you think either. Do you care to address to higher than average suicide rate among Mormons or the higher than average anti-depressant usage among Mormons?
I didn’t think so.
I didn't think so.
“Do you care to address to higher than average suicide rate among Mormons or the higher than average anti-depressant usage among Mormons?”
I’m familiar with the study you critics use as a basis for claiming Mormons use anti-depressant more than the average. It doesn’t actually conclude what you assert.
The study was done by a health insurance company, they only looked at their customers and noted their customers in Utah used certain prescriptions at a higher rate than their customers in other states.
I’ve studied statistics at the university level, and how critics use this study is such a blatant example of how to lie with statistics that a first year student should have no trouble spotting how invalid the media’s conclusions are.
First, they did not sample the general population, they only looked at their own customers. The products they offered would greatly impact who their customer base would be, for example, if priced high, their customers would tend to wealthier than average, if they did not offer a competitive discount for non-smokers, their customer base would have more smokers than the general population etc. etc. On this fact alone it is invalid to conclude that the study’s results for Utah has any relation to actual rates in the general population of the state. Likewise, the results of other states and the national averages from the study have no bearing on the actual state or national averages.
Second, the study did not identify the religion of their customers. There is no way to tell if any particular faith is over or under represented compared to the general population or even just their own customer base, so there is no justification to extrapolate the results as indicating anything about Mormons or any other faith.
Third, several medication used to treat depression are also used to treat other medical conditions and the study gathered no data on WHY those prescriptions were given. It is therefore invalid to assert that the high use of certain drugs indicates a high occurrence of depression.
To be fair, the LA Times (known for it’s bias against the LDS) reported the study in a very biased and misleading way, leading it readers to make all this invalid conclusions and burying the facts that discredit their claims towards the end of the article. Critics, if they want to be honest critics, should not be so quick to jump on drive-by media stories just because they like what they say.
I am not aware of any credible studies that establish a significantly higher rate of suicide among active Mormons, but feel free to present your evidence for examination. Even if such a study exists, it still wouldn’t establish a cause/effect relationship. Very little is really known about what causes mental illness, there could be genetic factors at play, environmental, and many other factors that a statistical survey would not be able to take into account.
I didn’t think so.
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I will.
As a person with one of the depressive illnesses, I know how people deal with this kind of illness. There is bassicly two ways to handle the problem, self medicate with alcohol or illegal drugs, or go to the doctor and get the afor mentioned medication. Given that most members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints do not drink alcohol or use illegal drugs we use doctor prescribed medicines.