Beyond Empathy: Familial Incarceration, Stress Proliferation, and Depressive Symptoms Among African Americans.

This article examines African American women's heightened vulnerability to depressive symptoms following familial incarceration, focusing on stress proliferation as a key explanatory mechanism. Using data from the National Survey of American Life, the study finds that familial incarceration is associated with increased chronic strains, financial strain, and family conflict predominantly among African American women, but not men. These secondary stressors partially mediate the relationship between familial incarceration and depressive symptoms, reducing the observed gender difference in mental health outcomes. The findings suggest that beyond emotional empathy (the cost-of-caring hypothesis), African American women's greater caregiving responsibilities and structural disadvantages contribute to their increased mental health burden in response to disruptive network events like familial incarceration.