Factors affecting stigma toward suicide and depression: A Korean nationwide study

Suicide attempts and depression are considerably misunderstood by Korean society. Studies regarding factors should provide basic information concerning the factors that should be considered when examining stigmatization.

This study aimed to investigate sociodemographic factors related to the social stigma toward people with a history of suicide attempts or depression in a Korean nationwide community sample.

Face-to-face interviews were conducted with participants selected via a multi-stage cluster sampling method; 779 respondents completed Link's Perceived Devaluation and Discrimination (PDD) scale to assess the social stigma they attached to suicide attempts, and another 743 completed PDD scale to assess the social stigma they attached to depression. Multiple regression analysis, including socioeconomic and psychiatric variables, was performed to identify the factors predictive of social stigma.

Results of multiple regressions revealed that age (β = .12, p = .018), sex (β = .08, p = .038), years of education (β = -.31, p = .006) and history of suicide attempts (β = -.11, p = .009) significantly predicted the degree of stigma toward people who had made suicide attempts, whereas age (β = .15, p = .003) and education (β = -.40, p = .001) also predicted the social stigma toward people with depression, sex and history of a depressive episode did not.

Older men with less education and no experience with suicide perceived suicide attempts more negatively. Similarly, older people with less education placed a greater stigma on people suffering from depression. These results suggest that greater access to higher education may reduce stigma toward people with mental illness.