Australian women more stressed and depressed than men, study finds

Australian women are reporting feeling more exhausted, depressed and having negative moods than their male counterparts.

Australian women are self-reporting being more exhausted, stressed and depressed than their male counterparts who say they are beaming with energy and low stress levels — new research has shown.

Queensland scientists analysed six mood profiles, dubbed iceberg, inverse iceberg, inverse Everest, shark fin, surface, and submerged, to compare how men and women reported their moods.

The study of more than 15,600 participants showed that women were much more likely to choose the “shark fin” profile which has below-average levels of tension, depression, anger, vigour and confusion and high levels of fatigue.

Women are more likely to report high levels of fatigue, depression and anger.

Men on the other hand reported being the “iceberg” and having high levels of energy and low stress.

“Significant variations in the prevalence of mood profiles by sex, age, and education status were confirmed. For example, females more frequently reported negative mood profiles than males, and older and more highly educated participants had a higher prevalence of the iceberg profile than their younger and lesser educated counterparts,” the study said.

The data was taken across a wide demographic, including men and women of various socio-economic statuses, aged, education levels and ethnic background.

Apart from the differences among sexes, the report also found considerable changes among different age groups.

“Participants aged 25–35 years reported higher tension, depression, anger, and confusion scores, combined with lower vigour and fatigue scores than those aged 18–24 year,” the study found.

And those aged over 46 years of age had much lower levels of tension and fatigue than their much young counterparts in ages 18-35.

Education levels also played a part in people’s exposure to a risk of depression, stress and fatigue.

“Tension, depression, anger, vigour, and confusion scores for the less than high school (educated) group were higher than for all other groups. The postgraduate group reported higher depression scores than all other groups,” the study said.