[The German version of the Community-Attitudes-Toward-the-Mentally-Ill (CAMI) inventory]

The German version of the Community Attitudes toward the Mentally Ill (CAMI) inventory developed by Taylor and Dear (1981) is presented.

The questionnaire was applied in a mail survey which was conducted in 3 small towns in Germany.

At the item level surprisingly positive attitudes toward people with mental illness were found. The factor analysis with the 40 Likert-scaled items yielded 4 dimensions (exclusion, integration, benevolence, social control) which account for 46 % of the total variance. As in previous studies, age had a negative effect and the level of education a positive effect on public attitudes, while the gender of the respondents had only a small effect. Familiarity with mental illness did not have an effect as important as in previous studies.

There is a close correspondence between the German version and the original version of the CAMI-inventory.