Title: Cultural Perspectives on Mental Health
Headings: Module 7: Cultural Perspectives on Mental Health
Module 7: Cultural Perspectives on Mental Health
Stigma, Discrimination, and Mental Health
Cultural Perspectives on Mental Illness
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Footnotes

Content: Although each individual’s experience with mental illness is unique, the following studies offer a sample of cultural perspectives on mental illness. A review of ethnocultural beliefs and mental illness stigma by Abdullah et al. ( 2011) highlights the wide range of cultural beliefs surrounding mental health. For instance, while some American Indian tribes do not stigmatize mental illness, others stigmatize only some mental illnesses, and other tribes stigmatize all mental illnesses. In Asia, where many cultures value “conformity to norms, emotional self-control, [and] family recognition through achievement”, mental illnesses are often stigmatized and seen as a source of shame. ( 7) However, the stigmatization of mental illness can be influenced by other factors, such as the perceived cause of the illness. In a 2003 study, Chinese Americans and European Americans were presented with a vignette in which an individual was diagnosed with schizophrenia or a major depressive disorder. Participants were then told that experts had concluded that the individual’s illness was “genetic”, “partly genetic”, or “not genetic” in origin, and participants were asked to rate how they would feel if one of their children dated, married, or reproduced with the subject of the vignette. Genetic attribution of mental illness significantly reduced unwillingness to marry and reproduce among Chinese Americans, but it increased the same measures among European Americans, supporting previous findings of cultural variations in patterns of mental illness stigmatization. ( 8)
Many studies have reported other significant differences in attitudes towards mental illness among ethnic groups in the United States.