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Food Insufficiency, Food Stamp Participation, and Mental Health†
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*Direct correspondence to Colleen Heflin, Harry S Truman School of Public Affairs, University of Missouri, 120 Middlebush Hall, Columbia, MO 65211-6100 〈heflincm@missouri.edu〉. Heflin will share all data and coding information with those wishing to replicate the study. The authors gratefully acknowledge the National Poverty Center at the University of Michigan for financial support. Heflin also received support through the University of Kentucky Center for Poverty Research. They also thank Chris Bollinger, J.S. Butler, Steven Haider, Steve Raphael, and Aaron Yelowitz for comments on an earlier draft. Sharon Kukla-Acevedo provided excellent research assistance. The views and findings reported herein are those of the authors and do not reflect the views of the National Poverty Center or any sponsoring agency.
Abstract
Objectives. This study examines whether the mental health consequences associated with food insufficiency vary by food stamp participation status and/or the value of the food stamp benefit received.
Methods. We use longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics along with fixed-effect methods that control for unobserved heterogeneity to test our hypotheses.
Results. We find that, conditional on the food stamp benefit amount, the emotional distress associated with food insufficiency is higher among food stamp participants. Moreover, we find evidence of a dosage effect such that food-insufficient individuals who receive higher amounts of food stamp benefits suffer greater emotional distress than food-insufficient individuals who receive lower levels of food stamp benefits. However, the negative mental health effects of food insufficiency and food stamp participation are driven primarily by periods of transition onto the Food Stamp Program and into food insufficiency.
Conclusions. The negative mental health aspects of participating in the Food Stamp Program seem to outweigh the positive mental health aspects, at least during the period of application and initial receipt, suggesting that programmatic reform is needed to improve overall well-being among new participants.