Intervention for reducing stigma: Assessing the influence of gender and knowledge

Area of Science:

• Mental Health Research
• Social Psychology
• Educational Interventions

Background:

• Social stigma surrounding mental illness remains a significant barrier to seeking help and promoting well-being.
• School environments are critical settings for early intervention and attitude formation regarding mental health.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effectiveness of an educational intervention in reducing social stigma among secondary school students.
• To assess how gender and prior knowledge of mental disorders influence the intervention's impact on stigma reduction.

Main Methods:

• A pre- and post-intervention study involving 62 secondary school students (ages 14-16).
• Utilized the Opinions on Mental Illness (OMI) questionnaire, assessing authoritarianism, interpersonal etiology, benevolence, restrictiveness, and negativism.
• Statistical analysis included t-tests for repeated measures, with data analyzed overall, by gender, and by knowledge of mental disorders.

Main Results:

• Significant improvements were observed across most OMI subscales post-intervention (P < 0.001), excluding benevolence.
• Gender-specific differences emerged: women showed changes in authoritarianism and restrictiveness, while men showed changes in negativism and interpersonal etiology.
• Students with prior knowledge of mental disorders improved in authoritarianism, interpersonal etiology, and negativism; those without prior knowledge improved in restrictiveness and authoritarianism.

Conclusions:

• The intervention successfully reduced social stigma, particularly in the area of authoritarianism.
• Overall positive shifts in attitudes toward mental illness were noted in the student sample.
• The specific areas of attitude improvement varied based on student gender and personal experience with mental disorders.