We have all the resources, but what we don’t have is the flexibility within our system to consider Mental Health Podcast RSS Feed the fact that we don’t necessarily need psychiatrists or drugs to take care of everyone who is suffering from anxiety or depression,” Mendenhall says. Studies have shown that certain racial or ethnic groups are overdiagnosed for some mental health conditions compared to other groups. Some may prefer to handle their mental health symptoms such as depression or anxiety through their religious leader. “In many cultures, doctors are so well respected that it is considered disrespectful to ask any questions,” Sheth says. Some anthropologists believe these semantic nuances, sometimes referred to as “idioms of distress,” can hold an important key to understanding cultural differences. Along with different ways of understanding and experiencing suffering, every culture has a different language to express it.
Healthcare Data Analytics and Digital…
For example, having a strong therapist–client relationship mediated the negative association between experiences of microaggressions and psychological health . Several recent studies have examined the influences of therapist characteristics, such as ethnicity, birthplace, and acculturation level on treatment processes and outcomes. Other than African American clients, the research indicated that racial match may influence treatment processes (e.g., engagement, retention), but not the outcomes of treatment (e.g., reduced distress or symptoms). African American clients were the only minority group where racial/ethnic match appeared to be strongly related to client preference, positive perceptions of therapists, and positive treatment outcomes 14••. Despite client preferences for racial/ethnic match, evidence suggests that ethnic match may not be a strong predictor of positive treatment outcomes 14••. Other studies provided some clarification for the mixed effects of therapist–client racial/ethnic match on treatment outcomes.
- Culture, including beliefs, values, norms, and behaviors, affects how we experience and interpret the world, including the meaning we impart to mental illness.
- This endeavor not only confirms the psychometric soundness of these instruments in an Arabic-speaking milieu but also identifies sociodemographic and clinical determinants of mental illness stigma.
- Understanding these cultural variations can help foster a more inclusive global conversation about mental health, where people from all walks of life feel seen, heard, and supported.
- Stigma can be examined from a range of related issues such as the perceptions of etiology as well as notions of shame and levels of interdependence in the community (20, 24).
Media, Culture, and Mental Health Narratives
Stigma around depression and other mental illness can be higher in some cultural groups and often is a major barrier to people from diverse cultures when accessing mental health services (12, 15). More than one in five U.S. adults live with a mental illness, yet cultural stigmas surrounding mental health deter many people from seeking treatment, leading to discrimination and silence. For Asian American and Middle Eastern American communities, cultural beliefs that seeking mental health treatment will bring shame and dishonor to the family leads some people to internalize their symptoms instead of seeking therapy.
The very concepts of normality and abnormality in Western therapeutic approaches are embedded in cultural constructions that cannot be easily generalized across cultures (27). The history of working with diverse cultural groups in healthcare in High Income Countries has numerous examples of stereotyping of specific cultural groups leading to interventions that are often inadequate or inappropriate (38, 39). Discrimination is also one of the major barriers to Aboriginal Peoples accessing mental health services, especially when the service is within a non-Aboriginal mental health setting (37).
If you’re struggling, talk to someone you trust—someone with experience in dealing with similar issues. When someone is in need, people show up and support each other. For me, I speak Chinese at home, but my Chinese isn’t fluent enough to fully explain concepts like mental health. For the youth in my community, there’s a growing understanding. For more information and support, visit headspace.org.au/cultural-identity. If people or organizations are able to provide funds or even resources on how to access funds – we are always looking for grants we can apply for.
