Researching and Reflecting on Low-Income Women's Mental Healthcare Access

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Miette Gourlay ('25), a Cinema and Media Studies major, conducted research on mental healthcare access for low-income women through the Penn Undergraduate Research Mentoring Program.

This summer, I worked with Dr. Jacqueline Corcoran to determine the prevalence of depression among women on welfare programs in the United States. Originally, I was drawn to her research because of my experiences working with low-income women and their families through both my volunteer work in my hometown of New York City and with the Netter Center at Penn, where I have helped connect underserved individuals to healthcare resources. Ultimately, by participating in research with Dr. Corcoran, I was hoping to learn more about these healthcare disparities with a specific focus on the field of mental health.

Over the course of the 10 weeks, I learned about the process of conducting a systematic review and meta-analysis—i.e., how data from many similar smaller studies can be combined and analyzed to produce a more definitive conclusion. We started by reviewing over 800 studies and ended up being able to gather data from 50 of them, meaning we drew conclusions from a population of 225,010 women on welfare, which I think is a pretty significant number of individuals! After analyzing the data, we determined that the prevalence of depression for women on US welfare was roughly one in three women, empirically justifying the need for increased mental health screening in this population. 

Participating in PURM and working with my mentor showed me how to take an entirely different approach to solving the healthcare disparities I was seeing in my volunteer work with low-income women by immersing me in the empirical data necessary to justify new policies and healthcare practices.

Through the process of research, I have developed new skills that will help me as I move forward. I have improved my ability to both read and write scientific language, perform statistical analyses, communicate my questions and suggestions, and collaborate with other scientists across institutions and, even, language barriers. Research has also shown me how to take an entirely different approach to solving the healthcare disparities I saw in my volunteer work with low-income women by emphasizing the importance of empirical data in the development of new policies and healthcare practices.

In addition to working on this study, Dr. Corcoran exposed me to many aspects of social work and mental health research by allowing me to read and help edit the textbooks, manuscripts, and research proposals that she was writing. Through reading about many of her and her colleagues’ experiences and asking her questions about patient cases with complicated circumstances, I was able to gain insight into the decision-making processes of healthcare providers and social workers, alike. Furthermore, as a result, I have become interested in exploring the ethical dilemmas involved in mental health and child welfare cases; and I am more certain that I want to work with women and families in medicine, no matter what field I end up going into in the future.- Miette Gourlay

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