Sex differences in mental disorders.

From Mental Health by Max Roser and Hannah Ritchie.

Click to enlarge.

Full of interesting information about this important topic and looks at the whole world and not just a single country.

What is striking to me is the sex differences. Women are 50% more prone to depression and anxiety disorders than men. In addition, depression and anxiety disorders are the two most frequent mental disorders. Men, on the other hand, are 100% more likely than women to suffer alcohol or drug use disorder, the third and fourth most frequent disorders. Those are large effect sizes.

Women are 73% of the victims in these four most frequent categories of mental health disorders, depression, anxiety, alcohol abuse and drug abuse.

Presumably those variations are due to some evolutionary circumstance, but what circumstance? What is going on here?