Prediction of students’ social distance towards mentally ill using affective and cognitive components of stigma

Abstract

It is known that mental health specialists are not free from stigmatizing beliefs about mental illness and these beliefs may impact specialists’ behaviour fostering social distance towards people with mental illness. However we still lack information which aspects of stigma – cognitive or affective – are more important for prediction of social distance, especially during the study years. This study was aimed to find out, which aspect of mental illness stigma – beliefs or emotional reactions – are more important predictors of social distance. 207 psychology and social work students from first to six year of study (mean age 22.3) participated in a cross-sectional survey. Students answered self-report questionnaire consisting of 12 questions addressing causal attributions of mental illness, 13 questions covering experience of fear, anger and sympathy towards people with mental illness and 9 questions addressing social distancing in personal and social relationships. Questionnaires were built for this particular study. The results have shown that senior students report less fear of people with mental illness. Cognitive beliefs about mental illness, anger, sympathy, and social distance do not change significantly through the study years. Regression analysis revealed that emotions felt towards people with mental illness, especially fear, are more important predictors of social distance than cognitive beliefs taking into account profession and year of study. The results imply that affective component of stigma of mental illness should be purposefully addressed while preparing future mental health specialists in order to change their stigmatizing behaviour towards people with mental illness.