‘Women are tired and men are in pain’: gendered habitus and mental healthcare utilization in Spain

ABSTRACT

Beyond differences in need, the gender gap in mental health might also be attributed to differential help-seeking practices between women and men. Employing Pierre Bourdieu’s sociology, the aim of this article is to interpret how gender influences healthcare seeking and utilization in common mental disorders such as depression or anxiety in Spain. Through thematic analysis of in-depth interviews conducted with healthcare providers and users of services, I reveal how the male/female oppositions in social and mental structures might result in gendered mental healthcare-seeking practices and differential enactment of agency that reproduce power relations between men and women. While men are less willing to seek healthcare, which is shaped by masculinity ideals, women appear to be dominated in the field which is likely to lead to their higher medicalization and, consequently, chronification. The article contributes to the literature analysing gender as a relational phenomenon and the social construction of gendered behaviours in light of Bourdieu’s sociology.

KEYWORDS:

• Mental health
• gender
• habitus
• healthcare seeking
• qualitative research
• Pierre Bourdieu
• Spain

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

This research forms part of a doctoral study funded by the Ministry of Education and Culture of the Principality of Asturias, Spain [Ref. PA-18-PF-BP17-003].

Notes on contributors

Sigita Doblytė

Sigita Doblytė is a Ph.D. candidate and researcher at the Department of Sociology, University of Oviedo, Spain. Her research focuses on health inequalities and behaviours, mental health, medicalization of society, gender and power relations.