ABSTRACT
The headline of the August 4, 1999, USA Today proclaimed that women in every economic, age, and social category of a large international survey reported more stress than men. This is not surprising. Women experience higher rates of depression and anxiety (Anderson and Holder, 1989; McGrath et al., 1990). They continue to carry the major burden for household and relationship work and are more stressed by the performance of these demands than men (Larson and Richards, 1994; Risman and Johnson-Sumerford, 1998). Women score lower on common measures of emotional well-being such as self-esteem and personal power, and the avenues historically available to them for self-expression have been limited (Lennon, 1996). Moreover, the standard by which psychological health has been measured is male. Thus it can seem difficult to be female and psychologically healthy at the same time (Anderson and Holder, 1989).
