Prepared by Dara Roth Edney, MSW
Canadian Mental Health Association, Ontario
January 2004
Table of Contents | Mass Media and Mental Illness | References
Introduction
Over the past 30 years, a substantial amount of research has been conducted to determine the effect of the mass media on the public’s belief systems. These studies have concluded that the media’s power to influence public perception and the degree to which people are exposed to media representations combine to make the mass media one of the most significant influences in developed societies.
In 2001, the Australian government published a large-scale literature review examining portrayals of mental health in the media (Francis, Pirkis, Dunt, & Blood, 2001). After considering dozens of studies that had analyzed news and entertainment media from around the globe (see Appendix A and Appendix B for tables summarizing the results of those studies), the review determined that media representations of mental illness promote negative images and stereotypes — in particular, the false connection between mental illness and violence. Many other studies have found a definite connection between negative media portrayals of mental illness and the public’s negative attitudes toward people with mental health issues (Coverdale, Nairn, & Claasen, 2002; Cutcliffe & Hannigan, 2001; Diefenbach, 1997; Olstead, 2002; Rose, 1998; Wahl, 1995; Wahl & Roth, 1982; Wilson, Nairn, Coverdale, & Panapa, 1999).
There have been fewer studies on the impact that negative public perceptions of mental illness may have on government policies. But sufficient evidence exists to indicate that if the public considers people with mental illnesses to be violent and/or unable to care for themselves, government policies and resulting legislation will look more toward containment and control than toward recovery and community living. If public perception of mental illness is based on negative and false images perpetuated by the media, there is a danger that government responses to systems and people in the mental health field will also be based on these false realities, rather than on the true needs and issues of people suffering from mental illness (Cutcliffe & Hannigan, 2001; Rose, 1998).
This paper highlights studies that provide evidence to support the following five hypotheses:
- the mass media are a primary source of public information about mental illness;
- media representations of mental illness promote false and negative images and stereotypes;
- there is a connection between negative media portrayals of mental illness and the public’s negative attitudes toward people with mental health issues;
- negative media portrayals have a direct impact on individuals living with mental illness; and
- there is a connection between negative media portrayals of mental illness and government responses to mental health issues.
Specific negative portrayals of mental illness and stereotypical negative characteristics of people with mental illnesses will also be explored.
For the purpose of this paper, the terms "media" and "mass media" include newspapers, radio, television, and film. Various studies cited focus on one or another of these media, and others examine some combination of media. Where the specific source is not mentioned, the reader can understand the terms "media" and "mass media" to include all of the above, although the important distinction between news and entertainment media will be made throughout.
The Mass Media as a Primary Source of Public Information on Mental Illness
Considerable research has concluded that the media are the public’s most significant source of information about mental illness (Coverdale et al., 2002 [citing Borinstein, 1992; Kalafatelis & Dowden, 1997; Philo, 1994]). Fiske (1987, cited in Rose, 1998) argues that television is the most powerful medium for framing public consciousness. Cutcliffe and Hannigan (2001) further state that rarely does a week go by without a reference to mental illness in the mass media. One study found that media representations of mental illness are so powerful that they can override people’s own personal experiences in relation to how they view mental illness (Philo, 1996, cited in Rose, 1998).
In 1997, the National Mental Health Association in the United States published a study titled "Stigma Matters: Assessing the Media’s Impact on Public Perceptions of Mental Illness." Hottentot (2000) cites the following results from that study, showing where — within various media classifications — the researchers found that the public gathers its information about mentally ill people and about mental illness.
| Popular Sources of Information about Mental Illness |
| TV newsmagazine shows | 70% |
| Newspapers | 58% |
| TV news | 51% |
| News magazines | 34% |
| TV talk shows | 31% |
| Radio news | 26% |
| Other magazines | 26% |
| Internet | 25% |
| Non-fiction books | 25% |
| Talk shows on radio | 18% |
| Women’s magazines | 18% |
Media Representations of Mental Illness Promote False and Negative Images and Stereotypes
The media play an influential role in shaping people’s attitudes about the world they live in and about the individuals who inhabit the world with them. Stories about or references to people with mental health issues are rarely out of the headlines in news stories or plotlines in film and television, yet research indicates that media portrayals of mental illness are often both false and negative (Diefenbach, 1997 [citing Berlin & Malin, 1991; Gerbner, 1980; Nunnally, 1957; Wahl & Harman, 1989]).
Negative Images and Stereotypes in News Media
Researchers at George Mason University in Virginia conducted a study of 300 articles containing references to mental illness that were taken from six different 1999 U.S. newspapers. Few of these stories presented positive images of people with mental illness or depicted people with mental illness as productive. This study and others like it have led researchers to conclude that the public, based on what they see in the news media, are likely to presume that people with mental illnesses are primarily burdens to society and incapable of contributing in positive ways to their communities (Wahl, 2001).
Cutcliffe and Hannigan (2001) cite a 1993 Glasgow University study that conducted a content analysis of 562 newspaper items containing representations of mental health and illness identified within local and national media over the course of one month. The study concluded that 62% of those stories focused on violence toward others in relation to a person with a mental illness. Stories that garner the most media attention appear to be those that make a link between mental illness, crime, and violence. Yet according to Monahan (1996), only 3–5% of violence in the United States is actually committed by someone with a mental illness.
The George Mason University Media Group Study mentioned above found that only 7% of all stories about mental illness included mental health consumers’ viewpoints (Wahl, 2001). A similar newspaper study conducted in Alberta over a three-month period found that the voice of a person with a mental illness was present in only one of the 72 articles evaluated (Hottentot, 2000). The scarcity of first-person accounts by people with mental illnesses in these stories limits the perspectives available to readers and conveys the false impression that people with mental illnesses are incapable of developing opinions and speaking on their own behalf.
Negative Images and Stereotypes in Entertainment Media
According to Diefenbach’s 1997 content analysis of television programming, depictions of people with inferred psychiatric conditions or stated psychiatric diagnoses were highly correlated with the portrayal of violent crime. Signorielli (1989, cited in Diefenbach, 1997) found that 72.1% of adult characters depicted as mentally ill in prime-time television drama injured or killed others. Characters with a mental illness were almost 10 times more violent than the general population of other television characters, and 10 to 20 times more violent during a two-week programming sample than real individuals with psychiatric diagnoses in the U.S. population were over an entire year.
Yet in reality, people suffering from a mental illness who do not have a concurrent substance abuse disorder are no more likely to commit a violent crime than anyone else (Steadman et al., 1998). In fact, one study found that 95–97% of violent episodes in the United States are committed by people with no mental illness (Monahan, 1996). Despite what is portrayed in the mass media, there is simply no reliable evidence to support the claim that mental illness alone (without substance abuse) is a significant risk factor for violence (Arboleda-Flórez, Holley, & Crisanti, 1996).
Commonly Depicted Stereotypes and Images of Mental Illness
According to Schneider (2003), some of the stereotypical depictions of people with mental illness include the following: rebellious free spirit; violent seductress; narcissistic parasite; mad scientist; sly manipulator; helpless and depressed female; and comedic relief. (See Appendix C for a list of films that fall into one or more of these categories. See also Appendix D and Appendix E for representations of mental illness in television and advertising, respectively.) Such characters have no identity outside of their stereotypical "crazy" behaviour, and are primarily identified by an inferred mental illness. When mental illness or behaviours commonly associated with mental illness are presented as a character’s main personality traits, to the exclusion of any other characteristics, the illness or behaviour becomes the only way of defining that person and the main point of the story (Day & Page, 1986, cited in Olstead, 2002). In such a one-dimensional depiction, people with mental illness become less than fully human: the mental illness becomes an enveloping identity.
Violence and Criminality in Entertainment Media
Over the past four decades, the most common depictions of mental illness in the popular media have involved mentally ill people who are violent and criminal (Cutcliffe & Hannigan, 2001; Olstead, 2002 [citing Day & Page, 1986; Nunnally, 1961]; Wahl & Roth, 1982; Wilson et al., 1999). Rose (1998) argues that psychosis is portrayed on television, as well as generally in the media, as an unclassifiable experience, and one that poses a threat. Mental illness is depicted as resisting clear meaning, and thus as incomprehensible, unpredictable, and unstable. Simultaneously, the recurring theme of extreme violence at the hands of mentally ill characters is the norm in mass media portrayals. Thus, asserts Rose, mental illness threatens common assumptions and behaviours in that people with psychiatric diagnoses (or those assumed to be mentally ill) are generally portrayed as unsafe, dangerous, and violent.
Violence and Criminality in News Media
Rose (1998) found that nearly two-thirds of all news stories examined involving those with psychiatric diagnoses could be classified as "crime news." Yet when news on the whole was examined, only 10% of stories were "crime news," with the other 90% of stories revolving around issues unrelated to crime or violence, such as politics, entertainment, and health. Thus it is not that news overall is dominated by stories about crime (as indicated by the fact that the majority of news stories focus on other topics), but rather that news stories featuring people with mental health problems are overwhelmingly given this specific and negative focus.
Simple-Minded and Childlike Portrayals in Entertainment Media
In an analysis of prime-time TV drama, Wilson et al. (1999) found that 43% of mentally ill characters lacked comprehension of everyday adult roles and appeared lost and confused. Characters typically spoke with grammatically simple language, in a childish voice, and were depicted as helpless and dishevelled. They were almost always poor and/or homeless and were being held by police for a crime about which they had little recall or understanding of having committed.
Social Outcast and Drain on Society in Entertainment Media
On television and in film, as well as in news reporting, there is an emphasis on people with mental illness as separate from the general fabric of society. They are often portrayed as unemployed, homeless, and without family or friends, roots or history. Olstead (2002) describes this as "lacking in markers of social identity" (p. 625), and argues that representing people with mental illness in this one-dimensional light supports a depiction of such individuals as subhuman. When mental illness is presented as an individual’s only characteristic, that person becomes defined by the illness in totality, thus becoming inherently different from others. The common association of mental illness and homelessness, without a broader discussion of the systemic issues that lead to homelessness, perpetuates the impression that most people with mental illness are dependent on others. This view maintains the idea that individuals with a psychiatric diagnosis are incapable of being productive members of society and are a drain on community resources (Day & Page, 1986, cited in Olstead, 2002).
In their previously mentioned analysis of prime-time TV dramas, Wilson et al. (1999) concluded that 67% of mentally ill characters depicted were seen to be unproductive failures. The point was illustrated by a lack of employment, ineffective or nonexistent interactions with family and friends, and by living alone in either dilapidated apartments, or on the streets. Fifty-five per cent of these characters were also portrayed as being totally asocial, lacking close relatives or friends and without any positive relationships within the community. They were, in fact, seen to live on the fringe of the community — at best, an inconvenience to those living nearby and at worst, a danger to them.
Victim to Victimizer in Entertainment Media
Wilson et al. (1999) found in their analysis of prime-time TV dramas that 55% of characters with mental illness were portrayed as helpless, unable to control their lives, and dictated to by the will of others. These characters were commonly subjected to harassment, false accusations, manipulation, or exclusion due to their mental illness. Although originally shown as victims of verbal and/or physical abuse, when pushed "too far," they became dangerously aggressive and even violent, thus shifting from the victim to the victimizer.
Depictions of Practitioners, Treatments, and Facilities
Entrenched prejudices against those with mental illnesses are often aided by negative and stereotypical images of psychiatrists, psychologists, mental health treatments, and mental health facilities. Guimón (cited in Freeman et al., 2001) asserts that the media present inaccurate and unflattering stereotypes of the psychiatric profession that misinform the public and undermine the credibility of mental health care practitioners.
Citing Glen Gabbard, author of Psychiatry and the Cinema, Grinfeld (1998) adds that since the mid-1960s, only three films portrayed therapists sympathetically (Good Will Hunting, 1997; Ordinary People, 1980; and I Never Promised You a Rose Garden, 1977). In every other instance, mental health practitioners were portrayed in one or more of the following ways: neurotic, unable to maintain professional boundaries, drug- or alcohol-addicted, rigid, controlling, ineffectual, mentally ill themselves, comically inept, uncaring, self-absorbed, having ulterior motives, easily tricked and manipulated, foolish, and idiotic. Such portrayals reinforce the idea that helping others is an unworthy vocation requiring little skill or expertise.
In the United States, fewer than 50% of those who experience mental disorders seek treatment (U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, 1999); in Canada, this figure is less than 33% (Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, 2002). Depictions of mental health practitioners as exploitative, mentally unstable, and unethical may do irreparable harm to people who are already hesitant to seek treatment, by making the prospect of getting help appear frightening and the help itself appear likely to be ineffective (Freeman et al., 2001; Healthweek, 2003).
Sympathetic but Inaccurate Representations
Negative and inaccurate stereotypes do the most damage. But positive, yet inaccurate depictions can also be harmful. In such cases, although the character may be presented in a sympathetic way, the inaccurate depiction does nothing to further the public’s education. Instead, it hinders their understanding of mental illness and of people living with psychiatric diagnoses.
In his book Media Madness: Public Images of Mental Illness, Wahl (1995) states that inaccurate information in the media about mental illness (even if the portrayal of the character is positive) results in misunderstandings regarding various mental illnesses and can have considerable practical consequences. Inaccurate depictions of, for example, schizophrenia (which is often confused in the media with multiple personality disorder) can lead to false beliefs, confusion, conflict, and a delay in receiving treatment. Family members whose relative does not exhibit symptoms similar to what they’ve seen portrayed in the media (symptoms that they believe to be a true representation of schizophrenia) may be confused and may lose confidence in the diagnosing clinician. The ability of family members and of the ill individual to recognize the onset of schizophrenia may be hindered by their misunderstanding of the true symptoms. Frustration and discord can result in a false perception that behaviours due to schizophrenia are in fact unrelated to the illness, and therefore without a reasonable cause (Wahl, 1995).
Class Differences in News Media Reporting
Olstead (2002) examined Canadian newspaper stories and analyzed representations of mental illness as they relate to violence and class. He found that when the subject was a middle-class person, only 14% of the stories reported details of the behaviours of the person with the mental illness. Rather, the focus was on their high-status occupations, their affiliations with prominent and/or influential families, and their socio-economic privilege. This is in contrast to the reporting style when the subject is poor and has a mental illness. In such cases, 62% of the articles emphasized poverty as a significant factor both in the mental illness and in the behaviours of the mentally ill individual. Of these articles, 89% went into detail describing the behaviours of the person with the mental illness, highlighting in particular incidents of criminality, violence, and dangerousness, as well as focusing on homelessness, panhandling, and the use of soup kitchens and shelters. These more common ways of reporting about mental illness leave the reader to surmise a link between mental illness, violence, criminality, and poverty, thus creating distance between the reader and the person with mental illness. By emphasizing what poor people do (behaviours) versus what middle-class people feel (emotions), such reporting encourages readers to identify and therefore sympathize with only a certain segment of the population.
This differentiation is furthered by the reporting of and emphasis on specific diagnoses as they are connected to people based on their income level. In 77% of the articles studied by Olstead featuring middle-class persons, the diagnosis named was depression. These stories depicted depression as a disease that imposed itself on the ill person. Conversely, 48% of the articles about poor people highlighted a diagnosis of schizophrenia. In these stories, the illness (also seen to be related to poverty) was portrayed as imposing itself not on the person, but on the larger society. This manner of framing mental illness and class distinctions is a way of establishing a context in which the mentally ill person can be seen as either part of, or apart from, society. Consequently, those people whose experiences are not understood or empathized with (poor people) are more likely to be seen as "other," and thus to be isolated and ridiculed (Olstead, 2002). This stance further contributes to a sense that mental illness happens to other people. Consequently, if people in power understand mental illness to be an illness that strikes only disenfranchised peoples, it will continue to be viewed as something that affects only a small minority of other people, and that therefore is not noteworthy enough to warrant appropriate levels of funding for research, treatment facilities, and community resources (Wahl, 1995).
General Classifications of Mental Illnesses
Specific diagnoses of mental illness are commonly omitted when the media present a description of an individual or fictional character. Rather, people are described in broad strokes as being a "psychiatric patient," "mentally ill," or just "crazy." It has been argued that in the absence of a clear diagnosis, audiences are left to generalize from one particular description of behaviours to all people with mental illness (Coverdale et al., 2002; Wilson et al., 1999). The likelihood of such generalization is high, based on the general public’s pre-existing views on mental illness and the ways in which the media usually depict people with mental illness. Coverdale et al. (2002) claim that such generalizations, and subsequent stigmatization, can be diminished through an illustration of specific psychiatric diagnoses, as well as by ensuring the relevance of such diagnoses to a reported incident. If a clear and specific diagnosis is not available, journalists and reporters should limit themselves to describing behaviours without implying that mental illness is the cause. There are a number of reasons why a person might be acting in a bizarre manner that do not include mental illness: for example, someone with a substance abuse problem or someone who is suffering from extremely low blood sugar may exhibit behaviours that are erratic and unpredictable — and yet neither necessarily has a mental illness. One cannot presume that unusual behaviour is an indicator of mental illness. Most importantly, if a person does indeed have a mental illness, this should be reported in an accurate fashion and only when directly relevant to the story.
Negative Media Portrayals and the Public’s Negative Attitudes
The few acts of violence committed by people with a mental illness are generally directed at family members, not strangers (Arboleda-Flórez et al., 1996). But media depictions of persons with a mental illness attacking a stranger shape public opinion. The saliency of such high-profile crimes, despite their infrequency, makes it appear as though violent crimes committed by individuals with a psychiatric diagnosis are common and that the general public has reason to fear people with mental illness.
In the United Kingdom, a 1996 Department of Health study found that news and entertainment media representations of mental illness have a negative effect on public perception (Rose, 1998). Another study, by the Glasgow University Media Group, confirmed the belief that people who saw a strong link between mental illness and violence derived their beliefs largely from the media (Philo, 1993). Research from around the world has found that the way in which news media cover a story and the way in which entertainment media tell a story in effect become the story. In other words, the actual events take a back seat to the underlying messages about mental illness, and in particular, messages about violence and unpredictability.
The media’s representation of people with mental illness as violent, dangerous, and unpredictable has resulted in the "mentally ill suffering societal scorn and discrimination" (Corrigan, 1998, p. 201, cited in Hottentot, 2000). Mistaken and negative depictions perpetuate the public’s damning image of people with mental illness and sustain continued intolerance and oppression. Such erroneous and negative associations are woven so thoroughly into the fabric of the public consciousness that sensationalism need no longer occur for the public to equate mental illness with dangerousness (Allen & Nairn, 1997, cited in Hottentot, 2000).
The Impact of Negative Media Portrayals on People with Mental Illness
A report by Mind, a U.K. mental health charity, asserts that negative media coverage has a direct and harmful impact on the lives of people with mental illness. Mind surveyed 515 people suffering from a range of disorders about their feelings regarding media coverage of mental illness. Half of the respondents said that the media coverage had a negative effect on their own mental health, and 34% said this led directly to an increase in their depression and anxiety. A total of 22% of the participants said they felt more withdrawn and isolated as a result of negative media coverage, and 8% said that such press coverage made them feel suicidal. Almost 25% of respondents said that they noticed hostile behaviour from their neighbours due to negative newspaper and television reports. A further 11% said they required additional support from mental health services due to negative press coverage, and almost 25% of all respondents said that they had changed their minds about applying for jobs or volunteer positions due to negative media coverage (BBC News Online: Health, 2000).
Wahl argues that the stigma due to negative media coverage impedes recovery, triggers discrimination, and creates barriers to seeking and finding decent housing, employment, and education (cited in NAMI, Aug. 2001). "People with mental illness are also readers and viewers of those [negative] images; they are shamed by them and they’re embarrassed by them," said Wahl in an interview in Psychiatric Times. "They’re aware that they are depicted in negative ways and it damages their self-esteem, it damages their confidence, and it increases their likelihood that they won’t tell anyone about their illnesses. So they’re not going to seek treatment" (Grinfeld, 1998).
Wahl (1995) states that negative images in the mass media influence not only the general public, but also health care professionals. He points out that although practitioners are trained, they are subjected to and influenced by the same misconceptions and negative imagery as the public. This influence can lead health care practitioners to approach, and thus potentially treat, mentally ill patients with the same negative attitudes portrayed by the media and accepted by the general public.
Negative Media Portrayals and Government Responses
A 1996 U.K. Department of Health study (cited in Rose, 1998) concluded that a link exists between negative media representations of mental illness and related social policies. If the public believes that those with a psychiatric diagnosis are either violent or victimized — and in either case, unable to care for themselves — government policies will reflect this attitude. Consequently, policy-makers will look more toward containment and control than toward recovery and community living. If public perception of mental illness is based on negative and false imagery perpetuated by the media, governments will react to these false realities rather than to the true needs of people with mental illnesses.
In addition, a world view that upholds false and negative stereotypes of people with mental illness leads to an increased level of fear in the community, which in turn translates to less support for community care and for individual human rights. This can result in increased legislation allowing, and social support for, forced treatment and hospitalization, as well as increased police power, as the public has been frightened into believing that they are at risk of violence from those with mental illness living in the community (Rose, 1998). Rather than supporting and welcoming diversity in the community, "it [is] not an exaggeration to say that mental health policy is now motivated by the desire to deal with risky individuals and to assuage the public disquiet" (Rose, 1998, p. 225).
Cutcliffe and Hannigan (2001) report that since the mid-1990s in the United Kingdom, mental health policy has taken on an "increasingly coercive appearance" (p. 315). They point to recent government proposals to tighten the English and Welsh Mental Health Act. They claim that there is an implicit relationship between negative and inaccurate representations of mental illness in the mass media and the development of current mental health policies and law in the United Kingdom. Holloway (1996, cited in Cutcliffe & Hannigan, 2001) also found that a more controlling mental health policy framework emerged in the 1990s due, in part, to a media-fuelled "moral panic") — a public feeling of fright and a belief that people with mental illness are morally deficient and thus a danger to society. Cutcliffe and Hannigan (2001) state that "the shift towards a coercive policy has, in part at least, much to do with the Government’s attempts to pander to inaccurate public perceptions, reactions, and intolerance. Furthermore…the public may have been ‘whipped up’ into this position of intolerance as a result of misleading, inaccurate mass representations of mental illness and mental health issues" (p. 318).
In a study of Canadian newspapers, Olstead (2002) concluded that in the current climate of cuts to health care, a belief that the mentally ill are inherently violent dictates that scarce resources should be used to safeguard the public, as opposed to filling the gaps in psychiatric and community mental health services.
Examples of Positive Portrayals
The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) produces an Internet newsletter titled StigmaBusters that reports on the mass media’s portrayals of mental illness. When positive depictions of mental illness are noticed, they are highlighted. One example was the September 2001 issue of Rosie magazine, which focused on depression. Rosie O’Donnell openly discussed her personal struggle, and other prominent people who have successfully battled depression were also featured, including Rosemary Clooney and Mary Wallace (wife of CBS correspondent Mike Wallace, who himself has suffered from depression — NARSAD, 2003). The story accurately informed the public and discussed the importance of ending stigma and discrimination (NAMI, Aug. 2001).
According to Wahl (cited in Healthweek, 2003), another example of a positive portrayal is the 1997 film As Good as It Gets, starring Jack Nicholson. In this film, Nicholson plays a romantic lead who has obsessive-compulsive disorder. The film accurately portrays the symptoms of this disorder and, even more encouragingly, shows the character, with the assistance of therapy and medication, winning the woman of his dreams and learning to live with and control his illness.
A third example is the television series Monk, which debuted in 2002. Its main character, a private detective named Adrian Monk, played by Tony Shalhoub, struggles with severe anxiety and obsessive-compulsive symptoms triggered by the unsolved murder of his wife. Because of his mental illness, Monk has been laid off from the San Francisco police department. But due to his skill as a detective, he remains several steps ahead of his former colleagues and continues to solve cases. NAMI reports that Shalhoub’s "portrayal of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is realistic and respectful" (NAMI, July 2002).
Conclusion
There is a complex relationship between mass media depictions of mental illness and the public’s understanding. McKeown and Clancy (1995, cited in Cutcliffe & Hannigan, 2001) state that this link is circular: negative media images promote negative attitudes, and ensuing media coverage feeds off an already negative public perception. The media must play a role in changing such negative perceptions.
In the past, people with physical disabilities were depicted in the media only when the story was about their disability. Today, it is becoming more common to see television characters whose physical disability has nothing to do with the storyline (for example, Dr. Weaver in ER and Doris in The Young and the Restless): they are characters like any other, and their disability is not significant to the story. This is far from the case with mental illness. In popular media, mental illness is most commonly portrayed as deviant and dangerous, and is also frequently the only noteworthy trait about the character.
For change to occur, accurate and positive messages and stories about mental illness and people living with psychiatric diagnoses must become more commonplace. Thornton and Wahl (1996) found that the influence of newspaper articles on people’s attitudes toward mental illness was more positive when study participants had received accurate supplementary information, indicating that change in the mass media’s depictions can produce change in public perceptions.
NAMI’s StigmaBusters newsletter has been responsible, through public letter-writing campaigns, for successfully removing offensive ads from television and radio, and more importantly, for educating media advertisers, producers, and writers about the impact of their negative and inaccurate depictions on people with mental illness (for several examples, see NAMI, June 2001, #2, and March 2002). It is essential that people working in the mental health field combat negative media portrayals and encourage public education programs. The myth regarding the inherent connection between violence and mental illness must be revealed, and accurate information must be disseminated to the public through the media. It is vital to highlight stories of successful recovery. Such stories of resilience and hope, if presented properly, can both educate and entertain audiences. Ultimately, the struggle of advocates for more accurate and positive representation of mental illness and of the mentally ill in the mass media is analogous to the struggles of other minority and disenfranchised groups. Wahl (1995) sums it up best when he says, "the civil rights movement offers one big lesson, speak up."
References
Appendix A: The Portrayal of Mental Health and Illness in the Media: Table of Key Studies
Appendix B: The Impact of Media Portrayal on Community Attitudes to Mental Illness: Table of Key Studies
Appendix C: Representations of Mental Illness in Film
Appendix D: Representations of Mental Illness in Television
Appendix E: Representations of Mental Illness in Advertising