Help-seeking for mental health: an exploratory cross-national study of Italian and South Korean university students

Mental health help-seeking intentions are associated with individual, social, and contextual factors, yet cross-national research comparing Western and East Asian populations remains limited, and few studies have evaluated whether cultural variables contribute explanatory value beyond established predictors.

A quantitative cross-sectional survey was administered to 304 university students (154 Italian, 150 South Korean) aged 19-35. A series of block-wise hierarchical regressions examined associations between demographic characteristics, social support, self-stigma, prior service use, and cultural variables with help-seeking intentions in two independently recruited national samples.

Support from significant others toward mental health services was associated with intentions in early model steps but lost significance when cultural variables were added. Prior experience with mental health services was positively associated with future intentions. Among the variables entered in the final model, nationality had the largest standardized regression coefficient (β = 0.251), with South Koreans reporting higher observed scores than Italians. Resistance to change-beliefs was positively associated with intentions, though this finding should be treated with caution given measurement non-equivalence. Independent and interdependent self-construal contributed no significant explanatory variance.

These exploratory findings suggest that nationality and individual-level cultural proxies may capture distinct dimensions of cultural associations and point to promising directions for future research on culturally adapted mental health interventions.