Lawyer mental health: depression, substance use and getting support

The core peer-reviewed source behind this page is Krill, Johnson and Albert's 2016 survey, published in the Journal of Addiction Medicine.

The researchers surveyed 12,825 licensed, employed U.S. attorneys — the sample behind every figure in this section.

What they found:

• 20.6% screened positive for hazardous, harmful or potentially alcohol-dependent drinking.
• 28% reported symptoms of depression.
• 19% reported symptoms of anxiety.
• 23% reported symptoms of stress.

Two scope notes matter before you quote these numbers yourself.

First, the study was published in 2016, which makes it about a decade old — treat it as a snapshot of the profession at that time, not a live measurement.

Second, the population is specific: licensed, employed attorneys.

The figures do not measure law students, legal staff, or attorneys who had left the workforce.

A survey measures how common these problems are among attorneys.

Whether and why the profession is more risky than other careers is a harder question, and the research on this page does not settle it — so read the rest of this section as context about how legal work is structured, not as a diagnosis of it.

One pattern the study did find: men had a higher proportion of positive drinking screens, and so did younger attorneys and those earliest in their practice careers.

That gradient is suggestive — the early years, with first clients and the push to prove yourself, fall on the people who screen highest — but it is a pattern in survey data, not a proven cause, so hold it loosely.

The structure of the work gives the numbers a context worth naming.

Legal work is adversarial: the stakes are a client's property, freedom or family, and the deadlines come from courts and filing rules rather than from anyone's preference.

In settings with billable-hour targets, the day is also counted and recorded.

Layer on how much of a legal career the license carries, and the reluctance to admit a struggle — and to look for help — starts to make sense.

These pressures show up across the settings our attorney careers guide compares, from private firms to government and in-house roles.

What differs by setting is how the pressure is packaged; what tends to stay is that the stakes are real and the license is personal.

This is the question sitting under everything else on this page: if you get help, does the license your career rests on come into play?

We will not give you a blanket yes or no, because admission and discipline are governed jurisdiction by jurisdiction, each with its own admitting authority and its own rules — and this page is career information, not legal advice.

What we can do is name where these questions get decided.

When a U.S. jurisdiction evaluates an applicant's background, it does so through its character and fitness process, and our character and fitness guide explains who runs that review and how the application works.

The rules that would connect treatment history to any licensing decision belong to each jurisdiction, and that authority is the only body that can say how its own rules apply to you.

There is at least one documented protection on the books.

In New York, Judiciary Law § 499 makes communications with a bar-sponsored lawyer assistance committee privileged on the same basis as attorney-client communications, waivable only by the person who gave the information.

That is New York's statute — we verified it there, and your jurisdiction's rules may differ, so check with its admitting authority rather than generalizing from any one state.

The profession-specific route is a state lawyer assistance program (LAP) — support programs for attorneys dealing with alcohol, drug and mental health concerns.

As a concrete example: California's Lawyer Assistance Program offers free presentations, short-term counseling (up to two free one-on-one sessions with a therapist) and support groups to active, inactive and disbarred attorneys, law students and bar applicants.

Those are the two examples our research verified for this page — California's program services and New York's privilege statute above.

We verified no others, so ask your state bar what its own program offers and how participation is treated where you practice rather than assuming either example generalizes.

Outside the profession, the ordinary routes are open to lawyers like anyone else: a primary care doctor or a licensed mental health professional.

And if you or a colleague is in crisis right now, the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline takes calls and texts at 988.

We did not verify firm-level data for this page — no count of how many firms run well-being programs, and no verified figure on what they spend or require — so we will not inventory employer programs or claim a trend.

What we can offer is how to read a prospective employer for yourself.

• Ask about workload directly in the interview, and note whether the answer describes systems or just enthusiasm.
• Compare the posted expectations with what attorneys already at the firm describe when you ask them.
• Watch how people at the firm look and sound at the end of a filing push, if you get the chance.

If you run a firm rather than work as one, the survey numbers above are an input into how your own workload and expectations land on the people carrying them.

If part of taking care of your working life is choosing where you practice, our board lists current attorney jobs across firm sizes, practice areas and settings.

Taking care of the career and taking care of the person doing it are allowed to be the same project.

This page is career information, not legal or medical advice. Licensing questions belong with the admitting authority in your state; health questions belong with a qualified professional.