Social Capital and Mental Distress in an Impoverished Community

Abstract

According to recent investigations of social capital, this social resource represents a key ingredient in a community’s capacity to respond to environmental challenges and promote change. This article investigates the significance of social capital for the health and well‐being of inner‐city residents using data collected from a sample of household decisionmakers residing in a high‐poverty, racially segregated urban neighborhood in a mid‐sized southern city (N=222). A psychosocial resources model of distress is employed to explore the role of social capital as a critical social resource mediating the impact of poverty‐related economic and environmental stressors on residents’ mental health. Regression analyses show no mediating effect of social capital on the relationships between economic and environmental stressors and mental health. While bridging social capital displays a small inverse relationship with distress, bonding social capital is actually positively related to mental distress. Bonding social capital appears to increase individuals’ levels of mental distress in this impoverished community. On the other hand, a psychological resource, mastery, plays a significant role in mediating the harmful effects of poverty. These findings suggest the need for some modification of recent claims that social capital is a critical resource promoting individual and community well‐being. Apparently, in high‐poverty, high‐minority, inner‐city communities, active participation in the local area comes at some cost to the individual. This article demonstrates the importance of doing further research on the social capital of inner‐city areas.