With the advent of deinstitutionalization of patient with mental illnesses, the role of families in taking care of their mentally ill relatives has become increasingly important (Kamal 2014). Family caregivers are responsible for monitoring their mentally ill family member who may still be symptomatic following hospitalization for illness related problems (Rose et al. 2006). Caregiving includes taking care of the daily needs of the patients, monitoring the patients’ mental state, identifying the early signs of illness, relapse, and deterioration as well as providing emotional support to their mentally ill relatives (Chadda 2014). However, family caregivers face challenges in handling their mentally ill family members, for example, increased …show more content…
2016). In fact, the most denoting burden faced by the families of patients with mental illness is the stigma (Greenberg et al. 1993). Stigma “is a characteristic of persons that is, contrary to a norm of a social unit” where a “norm” is defined as a “shared belief that a person ought to behave in a certain way at a certain time.” (Singh et al. 2016). Family caregivers are stigmatized through different stereotypes and prejudices. For instance, they are to blame for their relative’s mental illness, they are abnormal as they are associated with people with mental illness and the list goes on (Muralidharan et al. 2016). According to Gela and Corrigan (2014), stigma experienced by the family caregivers of patients with mental illnesses include public stigma, self-stigma, and label avoidance. Public stigma occurs when family caregivers experience negative attitudes from people in the family’s social network. It can be expressed in different ways, such as gossips, remarks that connote family blame for the mental illness, stares in public as well as social avoidance. Self-stigma is the psychological distress suffered by the caregivers for being a family member of an individual with mental illness. Label avoidance happens when family caregivers are reluctant to seek mental health services for their mentally ill relatives to avoid themselves from being labeled as family members of …show more content…
2016). Studies have shown that not only does stigma increase the burden of the family caregivers, it lowers their access to social support, resources, and opportunities (Kung 2003). The family caregivers of patients with mental illness feel isolated from their usual sources of support and hence social support is deemed the most vital resources for them in their caregiving processes (Saunders 2003). Social support is a reciprocal process that involves the provision of information and support by people whom we usually contact with which benefits both the supports providers and receivers (Amendola et al. 2011). Having social support in time of need helps to reduce the stress level of the family caregivers (Taylor 2015). According to Medical Outcome Social Support Survey, social support can be classified into five types, namely emotional support, informational support, tangible support, positive social interaction and affectionate support (Han et al. 2014). Emotional support involves talking to express about loss, feelings, or by merely being present and available to the family caregivers (Hay 2008). Friends and family members of the caregivers can provide informational support by giving information about stressful events that they experienced (Taylor 2015). Taylor (2015) also indicates that tangible support can be provided in the form of financial
From reading and reflecting her personal experience and journey with her sister, Pamela, I acquired a personal outlook of the deteriorating effects of mental illness as a whole, discovering how one individual’s symptoms could significantly impact others such as family and friends. From this new perspective mental health counseling provides a dominate field within not only individuals who may suffer mental illness such as Pamela, but also serve as a breaking point for family and friends who also travel through the illness, such as Carolyn.
When a loved one has a mental illness, it can be a challenge for the whole family: parents, siblings, friends and relatives. Coping with a mentally challenged child "is a shared experience for families and can affect all aspects of family functioning" (Reichman, year, pp.). From the movie, the Grape family is not only ...
The stigma and negative associations that go with mental illness have been around as long as mental illness itself has been recognized. As society has advanced, little changes have been made to the deep-rooted ideas that go along with psychological disorders. It is clearly seen throughout history that people with mental illness are discriminated against, cast out of society, and deemed “damaged”. They are unable to escape the stigma that goes along with their illness, and are often left to defend themselves in a world that is not accepting of differences in people. Society needs to realize what it is doing, and how it is affecting these people who are affected with mental illness.
The Modified Labelling Theory, created by Link et al., (1989) hypothesized that individuals who were labeled as mentally ill, would manage the stigma they faced through three coping mechanisms; education, withdrawal and secrecy (as cited in Ray & Brooks Dollar, 2014). The Modified Labelling Theory is a credible theory that has been used to approach not only the repercussions of stigma in mental illness, but also to explain behaviours of those who smoke, live with HIV/AIDS, or have a child with a disability (Ray & Brooks Dollar,
The Importance of Family and Friends in Helping People with Schizophrenia Maintain a Normal Life
Chien, W. (2010). Stress of Family Members in Caring for a Relative with Schizophrenia. New York: Nova Science Publishers.
A lot of the time parents and other family members center their attention on becoming knowledgeable about the the mental illness and look for resources to better help their loved one. Parents and family members may experiences others losses such as relationship or friendship loss or even financial loss as they learn how to help their child to deal with their mental disorder . A diagnosis of a mental disorder can impact the parents in several different ways. Particularly many parents who have a child diagnosed with a mental disorder, stress is a substantial impact for them. For instances, if a child is diagnosed with bipolar disorder, the parents have to learn to to cope with the changes in moods and behaviors such as mood swings or tempers. The stress can put tension on a relationship with other family members like their spouse and their other children. It can also cause you to have problems at work because you are missing work on multiple occasions, as well as cause you to have less alone or self-care time. No matter what the mental disorder
Millions of individuals will be affected by poor mental health, although anyone can experience these problems, there are people from certain backgrounds and social situations who put themselves at greater risk; there are many more factors than can influence or worsen the disorder. There are current theoretical models that analyse mental health stigma as a complex theme that involves many features, such as; social environment/backgrounds, stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination, behavioural problems and discrimination (Świtaj et al., 2014). There are many authors of different articles that agree that stigmatisation cannot be understood to it full extent without considering the perspective of people with mental illnesses, who ultimately play an important
Wittenberg, E., Saada, A., & Prosser, L. (2013). How illness affects family members: A qualitative interview survey. The Patient: Patient-Centered Outcomes Research, 6(4), 257-268. doi:10.1007/s40271-013-0030-3
The two different types of stigma have different effects on the attitude towards those with mental health issues. The public stigma can lead to discrimination and prejudice. The prejudice and discrimination that result from the public stigma can prevent those diag...
In the article Issues and Controversies says, "Throughout most of human history, people with mental illness were ostracized, isolated, and persecuted." ( Infobase,1) This belief system can give causation of mental illness in different cultures and such influences in a community will always be in a negative manner. Various societies struggle with the notion of mental health. The standards of every culture believe to be considered normal, natural, or healthy. These views lead to disagreements about the causes, diagnosis, and the treatment of the disorders. Many people with mental problems are discriminated against because of their mental disorder. Mental illness and stigma refers to the view of the person with mental illness as having undesirable traits. Stigma leads to negative behavior, stereotyping, and discriminatory behavior towards the person with mental health issues. This stigma causes the affected person to experience denial or shame of their condition. Perceived stigma can result in the patient being scared to seek help. Stigma can be divided into two perspectives, public and self stigma. Upadhyay says, "Public stigma occurs when the general
This article puts into perspective how those who are mentally ill lose their quality of life by becoming stigmatized by those surrounding them personally and in a broader sense. Their jobs, housing, health care, and affiliation with others is negatively impacted because of the stigma placed upon them because of their mental illness. This article continues to describe the stigmas that are placed upon the mentally ill by our Western culture. The authors state that mentally ill persons deal with being feared and excluded because of their mental state. They also deal with being viewed as irresponsible because of their mental diagnosis. Finally, they are seen as immature and childlike, thus requiring constant care to be put into place for them. Not only do these authors focus on public stigmas, but they also focus on how these cultural stigmas cause those who are mentally ill to begin to internally stigmatize themselves. This causes self-esteem issues; thus, this causes the individual to feel less worthy and less likely to succeed in his or her future in all areas of
The Theory of Caregiver Stress was a significant breakthrough for the reasoning of why caregivers are so deeply affected by this job. “The Theory of Caregiver Stress was derived from the Roy Adaptation Model to use as basis in understanding the relationships among caregivers and the stress faced when caring for a chronically ill relative” (Tsai, 2003). The Theory of Caregiver stress is a middle-range theory used to predict the outcome for stress and other various side effects (Dobratz, 2011). These adverse effects are predicted by: Demographic Characteristics, Burden in Caregiving, Stressful life events, Social Support and Social Roles. Also, because of the multitude of different scenarios and background for both the patient and the caregiver, these categories are necessary to compare and effectively use the results. The theory makes four main assumptions regarding adaption: “environmental change; the caregivers’ perceptions will determine how they will respond to the environmental stimuli; the caregivers’ adaptation is a function of their environmental stimuli and adaptation level, and lastly the caregivers’ effectors are results of chronic caregiving such examples include marital satisfaction and self-...
Self-stigma refers to the extent of self-concurrence with negative stereotypes of mental illness and to the extent to which these self-stigmatizing thoughts emerge habitually in everyday life. Self-stigma can occur at an unconscious, uncontrollable, unintentional, or efficient way. An unconscious way, is when an individual is having self-stigmatizing thoughts without being aware. An efficient way, is when an individual uses minimal attention to have self-stigmatizing thoughts. An unintentional way, is when the individual has no need for having self-stigmatizing thoughts but still has them. Lastly, an uncontrollable way is when the individual has a difficult time trying to get rid of the self-stigmatizing thoughts. If an individual cannot cope well with their self-stigma then it leads to even more frequent self-stigmatizing thoughts. This can lead to the self-stigmatizing thoughts to become a mental habit. This means that the self-stigmatizing thoughts become more repetitive and automatic. Not only can self-stigmatizing thoughts become a mental habit, but it can also result with label avoidance. Label avoidance has to do with the unwillingness to experience these stigmatizing thoughts and purposely trying to avoid them. However, label avoidance can actually make the self-stigma even worse. Label avoidance can actually increase the frequency of the thoughts. This can eventually lead to habitual
"A family is a small social group of people related by ancestry or affection, who share common values and goals, who may live together in the same dwelling, and who may participate in the bearing and raising of children. They have a physical or emotional connection with each other that is ongoing" (Vissing, 2011) and is the foundation of all societies. They can be formed by a grouping of father-mother-children or even more complicated combination of relatives. In the primary stage of family life in the United States, everyone from every generation lived together in one house. Subsequently, the idea of traditional family evolved and a married couple with children is at present, often called the traditional family. There are many types of families; however, this paper will focus on the traditional family. It will describe how the functionalist perspective, conflict perspective, and the interactionism theory apply to the sociological institution known as a family. It will explain some of the similarities and differences between the sociological theories in regards to families and how they affect the family members.