TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Mullins, Jamie
AU  - White, Corey
        TI  - Temperature and Mental Health: Evidence from the Spectrum of Mental Health Outcomes
        PY  - 2019/Sep/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 12603
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp12603
        AB  - This paper characterizes the link between ambient temperatures and a broad set of mental health outcomes. We find that higher temperatures increase emergency department visits for mental illness, suicides, and self-reported days of poor mental health. Specifically, cold temperatures reduce negative mental health outcomes while hot temperatures increase them. Our estimates reveal no evidence of adaptation, instead the temperature relationship is stable across time, baseline climate, air conditioning penetration rates, accessibility of mental health services, and other factors. The character of the results suggests that temperature affects mental health very differently than physical health, and more similarly to other psychological and behavioral outcomes. We provide suggestive evidence for sleep disruption as an active mechanism behind our results and discuss the implications of our findings for the allocation of mental health services and in light of climate change. 
        KW  - suicide
KW  - climate
KW  - weather
KW  - mental health
KW  - health
        ER  -