Possible sources of error in the evaluation of psychopathology

Mental health professionals have been described as biased in the evaluation of mental illness, almost always in favor of illness. It is a professional bias does exist, two factors could be responsible--situational expectancies and/or professional training. Undergraduate students (N = 32) and psychiatric residents (N = 16) listened to four recorded interviews. Two levels of mental illness expectany were obtained by changing the context of the interviews. The Ss rated the interviewees on scales of psychopathology and recorded their impression of the interviewees. Multivariate and univariate analysis of variance and chi 2 tests were used to evaluate the data. Evidence indicated that the biased perception of mental illness occurred for all Ss when mental illness expectancies were high. The data also indicated that residents are not more inclined than students to label people mentally ill.