Measuring Mental Illness Stigma (original) (raw)

Explicit and implicit stigma against individuals with mental illness

Australian Psychologist, 2007

Stigma against mental illness has devastating consequences for individuals with mental illness and their families. Empirical findings and qualitative evidence indicate that stigma against mental illness remains rampant in many nations and cultures, constituting a significant barrier to successful treatment, reducing key life opportunities, and predicting poor outcomes over and above the effects of mental illness per se. In this article, we define stigma, examine relevant theoretical perspectives, summarize evidence regarding

Understanding the impact of stigma on people with mental illness

World psychiatry : official journal of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA), 2002

Table 1 Comparing and contrasting the definitions of public stigma and self-stigma Public stigma Stereotype Negative belief about a group (e.g., dangerousness, incompetence, character weakness) Prejudice Agreement with belief and/or negative emotional reaction (e.g., anger, fear) Discrimination Behavior response to prejudice (e.g., avoidance, withhold employment and housing opportunities, withhold help) Self-stigma Stereotype Negative belief about the self (e.g., character weakness, incompetence) Prejudice Agreement with belief, negative emotional reaction (e.g., low self-esteem, low self-efficacy)

Structural Levels of Mental Illness Stigma and Discrimination

Schizophrenia Bulletin, 2004

Most of the models that currently describe processes related to mental illness stigma are based on individuallevel psychological paradigms. In this article, using a sociological paradigm, we apply the concepts of structural discrimination to broaden our understanding of stigmatizing processes directed at people with mental illness. Structural, or institutional, discrimination includes the policies of private and governmental institutions that intentionally restrict the opportunities of people with mental illness. It also includes major institutions' policies that are not intended to discriminate but whose consequences nevertheless hinder the options of people with mental illness. After more fully denning intentional and unintentional forms of structural discrimination, we provide current examples of each. Then we discuss the implications of structural models for advancing our understanding of mental illness stigma, including the methodological challenges posed by this paradigm.

Stigma as Related to Mental Disorders

Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 2008

Individuals with mental illness receive harsh stigmatization, resulting in decreased life opportunities and a loss of independent functioning over and above the impairments related to mental disorders themselves. We begin our review with a multidisciplinary discussion of mechanisms underlying the strong propensity to devalue individuals displaying both deviant behavior and the label of mental illness. Featured is the high potential for internalization of negative perceptions on the part of those with mental disorders—i.e., self-stigmatization. We next focus on several issues of conceptual and practical relevance: (a) stigma against less severe forms of mental disorder; (b) the role of perceptions of dangerousness related to mental illness; (c) reconciliation of behavioral research with investigations of explicit and implicit attitudes; (d) evolutionary models and their testability; (e) attributional accounts of the causes of mental illness, especially to personal control versus biog...

Brief battery for measurement of stigmatizing versus affirming attitudes about mental illness

Psychiatry Research, 2014

Decreasing the stigma of mental illness is not sufficient. Rather promoting important ideas, such as recovery, empowerment, and self-determination, is important to increase social inclusion, or more broadly, affirming attitudes. The goal of this article is to evaluate the psychometrics of a battery of measures that assess both stigmatizing and affirming attitudes toward people with mental illnesses. The aforementioned battery was used in four separate RCTs on stigma change with different samples: college students, adults, health care providers, and mental health service providers. Test-retest indices were satisfactory for all samples except for the Empowerment Scale score for the mental health providers. Attribution Questionnaire-9 (AQ-9) scores were significantly and inversely associated with the three affirming attitude scale scores for eight of twelve correlations, with five of these meeting the Bonferroni Criterion. Research on social attitudes and structures needs to incorporate assessment of affirming perspectives about a group and effective anti-stigma programs need to promote social inclusion and affirming attitudes.

Trends in Public Stigma of Mental Illness in the US, 1996-2018

JAMA Network Open

IMPORTANCE Stigma, the prejudice and discrimination attached to mental illness, has been persistent, interfering with help-seeking, recovery, treatment resources, workforce development, and societal productivity in individuals with mental illness. However, studies assessing changes in public perceptions of mental illness have been limited. OBJECTIVE To evaluate the nature, direction, and magnitude of population-based changes in US mental illness stigma over 22 years.

The Impact of Mental Illness Stigma on Seeking and Participating in Mental Health Care

Psychological science in the public interest : a journal of the American Psychological Society, 2014

Treatments have been developed and tested to successfully reduce the symptoms and disabilities of many mental illnesses. Unfortunately, people distressed by these illnesses often do not seek out services or choose to fully engage in them. One factor that impedes care seeking and undermines the service system is mental illness stigma. In this article, we review the complex elements of stigma in order to understand its impact on participating in care. We then summarize public policy considerations in seeking to tackle stigma in order to improve treatment engagement. Stigma is a complex construct that includes public, self, and structural components. It directly affects people with mental illness, as well as their support system, provider network, and community resources. The effects of stigma are moderated by knowledge of mental illness and cultural relevance. Understanding stigma is central to reducing its negative impact on care seeking and treatment engagement. Separate strategies ...