Mental illness is an important topic that is rarely spoken or taught in today’s society. About half of people in the world have a mental health disorder, yet most people don’t know what it really means to have a serious health problem. There are numerous theories on why these disorders happen; additionally, some disorders in the world are still a mystery to the science community and also millions of people share these personal experiences through writing. What is Mental Health and its comparison to Mental Illness Numerous people in today’s society have yet to fully understand what mental illness is; therefore, they really need to understand the meaning of the word. According to the article “What is Mental Illness,” mental health is foundation for thinking, communication, learning, self esteem, and it also plays a key role in close relationships.
Thus culture and beliefs has an impact in stigma of mental illness, for instance when a mentally ill person portrays episodes of hallucination, the society may mock that person and isolate themselves from him/her with the believe that all mentally ill people are violent and dangerous and may cause harm to others. Every society has its norms and values, which detects what is expected of every member in a form of behaviour. These values may take part in the stigma that is experienced by mentally ill people in communities, because when an individual is mentally ill, they may also change in behaviour and depict a bizarre character. The behaviour that is drawn by the mentally ill person may lead to stigma because people would isolate themselves from them because of the odd behaviour that is shown by that particular person which is against the norms and the values of the society. Nevertheless, an attitude towards mental illness can lead to stigma, because when a society has a negative attitude towards mentally ill people, stigma may
Introduction A mental illness is a medical condition that disrupts a person's thinking, feeling, mood, ability to relate to others and daily functioning. Mental illnesses are medical conditions related with brain, which generally results in diminished individual coping capacity with daily demands of life. Sufferer of mental illness can be a child, adult, old age people, mental illness can affect any person of any religion caste, and race and income. Recovery with mental illness is possible. Mental illness can be understood by many models like spiritual model, Psychological Models, Psychosocial Model, biomedical model, biomedical model is based on scientific aspects of medicine.
This false viewpoint can inhibit personal growth and confidence in individuals with a psychological disorder. This common myth could also lead to pity from society as well as healthcare professionals which could in turn make the patient believe that they are unable to get better and take care of themselves successfully. In all, for change to occur, society must start providing more positive representations of people with mental illnesses. This includes the removal of stigmatization of psychological disorders in the media so that society can have a better understanding of what such individuals actually
Mental illness is becoming more and more prevalent in today’s society and learning more about it can benefit both people who struggle with it and those who do not. “Mental illnesses are health conditions involving changes in thinking, emotion or behavior (or a combination of these)” (What is Mental Illness). The subject of mental illness is nothing new, in fact it has been around for centuries. The first public understanding of what mental illness was and how to treat it came about when a man named Hippocrates, a pioneer in treating mentally ill patients, began to use techniques not rooted in any religious or superstitious beliefs, but rather in changing the environment and occupation of the patient (Early). Any mental illness recorded before
Introduction Mental disorders refer to a wide range of mental conditions the affect the mood, thinking and behavior of an individual. Examples of mental disorders include; depression, anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, eating disorder and addictive behavior. Many people in Kenya go through some kind of mental health concern from time to time, but this mental health concerns will deteriorate in to mental disorders when persistent signs and symptoms cause frequent stress and effect on an individual’s ability to function properly. Mental disorders account for a huge portion of disease that is largely misunderstood and ignored. Annually about 30% of global population are affected by a mental disorder of some kind and only less than a third of those
In our society the people who are suffering with mental illness known as most stigmatized . Elliot and colleagues reports that the stigma which is associated with Mental illness creates social barrier to the Mentally ill people. They are treated differently from the normal people and excluded from the community with the perception of abnormal interaction, dangerous and also with not predictable behaviour . All these situations in society creates a challenge to the mentally ill to face not only their illness but also the community. Public stigma may leads the stress in mentally ill, which will increase psychological problems like depression, anxiety and low self-esteem.
Besides influencing our perception of mental illness, culture also influences whether or not people seek treatment, and who they decide to seek treatment from. Who people will go to for treatment, will depend on what the cause of mental illness is perceived as, e.g. if the cause for the disorder is seen as being due to God’s wrath or evil spirits, people may be inclined to go to religious heads for treatment. Asian American mainly look to their extended family and folk healers for help during difficult times, and so professionals will probably not be visited.
This is one of the compelling deliberations of how individual with mental disorder lives. Thoughts, fear, chaos, and mostly, confusion are some of the excruciating agony that a victim would have to deal with. Consequently, stress due to mental disorder causes increased alcohol intake, tobacco use, poor diet and even high-risk sexual behavior. In addition, according to mentalhelp.net, between 30 to 70 percent of the people who commit suicide suffer from rational disarray. It has become apparent that mental disorders do affect a person’s social life.
Mental illness is something that is often judged and made fun of. If any progress is going to happen, that needs to stop. Mental illness needs to be normalized before it can be cared for. If this judgements are continued, it will only cause these people with the disorder to become spiteful and not want to get the care they