Around the globe, one in eight people suffer from a mental health condition (World Mental Health Report, 2022). These prevalence rates vary by demographics like age and sex – but anxiety and depressive disorders are the most common, in both men and women.
Despite growing awareness around mental health, the topic remains a taboo for many. Stigma often forces millions of individuals into silence. Perhaps the most grave impact of lack of mental health awareness and access stems from the startling rates of suicide across the globe. WHO reports that suicide accounts for one in every 100 deaths globally. In fact, it is one of the leading causes of death among young people.
The question then arises: How can we address this issue? If you’re someone who’s passionate about promoting mental health awareness, this blog is for you. Read on to discover some actionable ways in which you can help promote awareness and combat stigma in your community.
Understanding Mental Health Stigma
Stigma remains one of the biggest barriers to mental health awareness. It can manifest in different ways — from prejudice, discrimination, to hesitancy in seeking help. Let’s understand stigma better:
What is Stigma?
Pescosolido and colleagues (2021) describe stigma around mental health as the prejudice and discrimination towards mental illness, which interferes with various aspects of people’s lives.
Stigma can manifest in several ways that are detrimental to mental wellbeing:
- It discourages those facing challenges from seeking help and treatment.
- It creates a social distance between those suffering from mental illness and the broader community.
- For those with serious mental disorders (such as schizophrenia and PTSD), it can often worsen treatment outcomes as it distances them from their community and leads to experiences of discrimination.
- Stigma does not just signify an attitude at an individual level, but also public perception of mental illness – which may leave more and more people hesitant to seek help and often less likely to even discover that they are facing mental health challenges.
Current Trends Around Mental Health Stigma
Pescosolido (2021) reviewed the state of mental health stigma in the USA, by reviewing patterns over a 22 year period starting from 1996 to 2018. They found that:
- Public stigma towards depression has reduced considerably.
- Today, there’s greater public recognition of scientific explanations for mental illnesses like schizophrenia and alcohol dependence.
- However, though there has been progress in understanding mental illness, it has not led to acceptance. Public perception towards schizophrenia is particularly problematic – there now exist increased beliefs that those with the disorder are “dangerous”.
This tells us that not only do we need to address stigma through a broader level of awareness regarding mental health — but we also need continued efforts to foster empathy amongst people, especially for disorders that one may feel less closely related to, such as schizophrenia.
The Importance of Mental Health Awareness
The National Rural Health Association (2015) identifies four key barriers in mental and behavioral healthcare, including
- Availability: Shortages of mental health professionals and services
- Accessibility: Lack of knowledge about services, travel difficulties, and poor service coordination
- Affordability: High costs of mental health care and limited insurance coverage
- Acceptability: Stigma and negative perceptions surrounding mental health services.
This framework helps us recognize what we need to work with. As an individual, solving problems of availability and affordability may be beyond your scope. However, individuals can contribute to improving mental health awareness by promoting acceptability and accessibility.
Here are some steps you can take:
How You Can Promote Mental Health Awareness
Encourage Acceptability
The most direct way to make an impact is by actively contributing to a culture of acceptance. Promoting acceptance involves actively working on stigma in your own community. You can do this by:
-
- Normalizing conversations around mental health. Make mental health discussions a part of everyday life by checking in on friends, family, or colleagues in casual settings. For example, simply starting by asking “How are you really doing?” and sharing your own experiences can encourage openness and help reduce stigma.
- Encouraging others to seek help when needed. Have a friend or colleague that’s been struggling? Lend them a listening ear and try to be there for them. When the time is right, gently nudge them to seek professional help. Something as simple as offering to help find a therapist or accompanying them to an appointment can be incredibly supportive.
- Mythbusting against strong prejudices. As noted earlier, there is a prevalent desire for social distance amongst communities towards people diagnosed with schizophrenia. It is important to bust myths around issues such as these, and encourage others to cultivate empathy.
Increase Access to Resources
Increasing access may sound like a big initiative, but it doesn’t have to be. At an individual level, improving accessibility can be as simple as:
- Compiling lists of local and online mental health resources.
- Engaging with professionals on social media to understand available services.
- Supporting mental health organizations and initiatives.
Share Your Story
Sharing personal stories is a great way to get more people to engage! Studies such as those of Kosyluk et al. (2020) have attempted to begin storytelling initiatives to raise awareness about mental health and help cultivate empathy for those suffering. In their study, participants exposed to personal mental health stories experienced:
- Reduced perception of difference from people with mental illnesses.
- Decreased social distance toward those with mental health conditions.
A personal story does not have to be something unfathomably difficult, it can also be around general struggles with mental health in your daily life. If you choose to share your story, consider:
- Using trigger warnings for sensitive content.
- Adjusting privacy settings for your safety.
- Focusing on emotions and resilience rather than specific traumatic details. Emotions help people connect with you, and resilience can help your audience feel inspired.
Keep Educating Yourself and Others
The landscape of mental health is one of those areas of knowledge where you cannot possibly have educated yourself enough. New research comes out everyday and we discover something incredible about our minds.
If you’re reading this blog, chances are you already are making attempts at keeping yourself updated, which is an amazing effort. Other steps you can take include:
- Stay informed about mental health research and best practices. Follow reliable sources of information – websites that clearly quote the source of their claims, and talk about mental health with facts and research.
- Hear a common misconception circulating in your community? Share factual information to dispel them. Keeping yourself informed will help you do this with ease. Mythbusting is especially important to generate more empathy towards people with serious mental disorders.
Utilize Social Media for Mental Health Awareness
Social media can be a powerful tool when used responsibly. Steps you can take on social media include:
- Encouraging open discussions around mental health issues. This can be done, again, by sharing your personal stories – or by asking questions about mental health that intrigue you. You never know which person from your follower list may open up an insightful dialogue.
- Repost and share accurate information from reliable pages and organizations who are already working towards raising mental health awareness.
- If you’re motivated enough – go ahead and begin creating engaging content around mental health. But remember to keep everything you share close to straight facts and robust research!
Hosting Community Events
If you have the resources and the passion to advocate at a larger scale, it could be a good idea to start your own community events.
- For instance, if you’re in college or school – you can plan an event around creating awareness. This could be something as simple as starting a mental health check-in circle or a private book club. It could also be something largescale such as hosting a fundraising event.
- If you’re an employee, talk to people in charge about hosting events surrounding mental health awareness. Offer to take the initiative to plan out events and seminars around mental health,
- Collaborating with local mental health organizations to provide workshops and resources in your community may also do wonders. This is recommended if you feel a bit overwhelmed by the idea of hosting and leading a discussion yourself.
Share Accessible Resources for Your Community
We’re all part of different communities, perhaps you wish to improve awareness in your neighborhood, or in your ethnic/religious group, or simply at your school/workplace.
Different communities have different needs. Evaluate relevant mental health issues within your community and take the proactive step to tailor resources you share and suggestions you give accordingly.
Take steps to:
- Compile a list of mental health resources available to your community.
- Assess what’s missing in mental health accessibility in your community and work to fill those gaps.
- Use local community networks to spread awareness and provide support.
Conclusion
Taking on the burden of promoting mental health awareness in one’s community is certainly not an easy task, but it is definitely a meaningful, purposeful, and admirable effort. With the high prevalence rates surrounding mental illness, and the devastating suicide rates across the globe, there has not ever been a time as good as now to generate awareness around mental health.
Promoting mental health awareness in your community requires a multifaceted approach. Whether through fostering acceptability, increasing access, sharing personal experiences, or challenging myths, every effort counts. Dedicated efforts towards such an initiative can help us create a more inclusive and compassionate society.
References
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Roberts, B., Mohatt, M., New Freedom Commission on Mental Health, National Center for Health Statistics, Warner, J., Thurston-Hicks, H., Health Resources and Services Administration, Kessler, Ricketts, Johnson, R., Baldwin, Gamm, P., Holzer, C., Geller, Lambert, B., Vega, C., & Rost, B. (2015). The future of rural behavioral health. https://www.ruralhealth.us/NRHA/media/Emerge_NRHA/Advocacy/Policy%20documents/The-Future-of-Rural-Behavioral-Health_Feb-2015.pdf
Freeman, M. (2022). The World Mental Health Report: transforming mental health for all. World Psychiatry, 21(3), 391–392. https://doi.org/10.1002/wps.21018
Kosyluk, K., Marshall, J., Conner, K., Macias, D. R., Macias, S., Beekman, B. M., & Her, J. (2020). Challenging the stigma of mental illness through creative storytelling: a randomized controlled trial of This is my brave. Community Mental Health Journal, 57(1), 144–152. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10597-020-00625-4
Pescosolido, B. A., Halpern-Manners, A., Luo, L., Perry, B., Halpern-Manners Pescosolido, & Perry Pescosolido. (2021). Public health trends in public stigma of mental illness in the US, 1996-2018. JAMA Network Open. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2021.40202
