Open AccessReducing Mental Health Stigma: A Case Study
Author(s) -
Heather Stuart,
Michelle Koller,
Romie Christie,
Mike Pietrus
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
healthcare quarterly
Language(s) - Uncategorized
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 1929-6347
DOI - 10.12927/hcq.2011.22362
Subject(s) - mental illness , mental health , feeling , cronbach's alpha , attribution , stigma (botany) , psychology , intervention (counseling) , social distance , social stigma , scale (ratio) , clinical psychology , test (biology) , journalism , social psychology , psychiatry , medicine , family medicine , psychometrics , human immunodeficiency virus (hiv) , law , pathology , biology , paleontology , covid-19 , quantum mechanics , political science , physics , disease , infectious disease (medical specialty)
The purpose of this study was to evaluate a contact-based educational symposium designed to reduce mental health-related stigma in journalism students. Repeated surveys conducted before (n = 89) and again after the intervention (n = 53) were used to assess change. The estimated average response rate for each survey was 90%. The instrument, adapted from prior research, contained items pertaining to stereotypical content, attitudes toward social distance and feelings of social responsibility (Cronbach's alpha =.74). There was a statistically significant reduction in stigma (reflecting a 5% reduction in the aggregated scale score). A large, item-specific change was noted pertaining to attributions of dangerousness and unpredictability (reflecting a 26% improvement). The majority of students reported that the symposium had changed their views of people with a mental illness. Half of these students considered that they would change the way they would report stories involving someone with a mental illness. A potential unexpected negative side effect was that 14% fewer students reported post-test a willingness to go to a doctor if they experienced a mental illness. Though it is difficult to draw firm conclusions from an uncontrolled study, it would appear that this relatively brief, contact-based intervention changed journalism students' views of people with a mental illness. More controlled investigation is needed to rule out alternative explanations that could account for this change.