Lifestyle Risk Factors and Mental Health in Older Men

Dear Colleagues,

Approximately 20% of adults aged over 60 years are estimated to experience some type of mental or neurological disorder, including cognitive impairment, dementia, anxiety, and depression. Mental health issues are often implicated in suicidal thoughts. With the rapid increase in older populations worldwide, mental health has become a key issue for healthy and successful aging. However, despite their high prevalence and clinical significance, mental health conditions are under recognized, undertreated, and often viewed as an inevitable part of the normal aging process. Understanding the complex etiology of mental health conditions is critical to finding an effective strategy for healthy and successful aging. Lifestyle risk factors that have been implicated in mental health later in later life include physical inactivity, sarcopenia, smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, overweight/obesity, unhealthy diets, use of illicit substances, and sexual health. The mechanisms linking these factors to mental health are still to be fully explored.

Clearly, there is a strong need for further studies of the etiology and pathology of mental health conditions and of preventive strategies. For this Special Issue, we invite contributions from cross-sectional and prospective studies, as well as systematic reviews and meta-analyses of lifestyle risk factors and mental health in men. We also encourage submissions regarding gender-specific differences in the association between exposures and outcome.

Hyunsik Kang and  Donghyun Kim

Guest Editors

Manuscripts should be submitted via our online editorial system at https://www.jomh.org by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to start your submission. Manuscripts can be submitted now or up until the deadline. All papers will go through peer-review process. Accepted papers will be published in the journal (as soon as accepted) and meanwhile listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, reviews as well as short communications are preferred. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office to announce on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts will be thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. Please visit the Instruction for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) in this open access journal is 1500 USD. Submitted manuscripts should be well formatted in good English.