Turning the tide

Psychologist Zhang Chun likes to try new things, such as boxing and stand-up comedy. In psychologist Zhang Chun's consult ing room in Xiamen, Fujian province, she has witnessed the struggles of women, their awakening in society and their changing attitudes to traditional family roles. According to the World Health Organization, about 264 million people around the world have depression, and more women are affected than men. A report led by Huang Yueqin, director of the Division of Social Psychiatry and Behavioral Medicine at Peking University's Institute of Mental Health, which was published in The Lancet Psychiatry in 2019, indicates that, in China, about 65 percent of people with mental disorders are female. "Besides reasons caused by biology, I think the answer is simply that women live under more stress than men," Zhang concludes.