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WEDNESDAY, July 3, 2019 (HealthDay News) — A social marketing campaign in California designed to reduce stigma about mental health issues appears to have encouraged more people to seek care for their symptoms of mental distress, according to a study published online June 26 in the American Journal of Public Health<\/i>.<\/p>\n
Rebecca L. Collins, Ph.D., from the RAND Corporation in Santa Monica, California, and colleagues surveyed 1,954 California adults experiencing symptoms of probable mental illness in 2014 and 2016 during a major stigma reduction campaign.<\/p>\n
The researchers found that campaign exposure predicted treatment use overall (odds ratio [OR], 1.82; 95 percent confidence interval [CI], 1.17 to 2.83). Exposure to the campaign was associated with perceived need for services (OR, 1.64; 95 percent CI, 1.09 to 2.47) but was not significantly associated with treatment use in models based on perceiving a need (OR, 1.52; 95 percent CI, 0.78 to 2.96). While campaign exposure was associated with less stigma, adjusting for stigma did not affect associations between exposure and either perceived need or treatment use.<\/p>\n
“Social marketing has potential for addressing underuse of mental health services and may benefit from an increased focus on perceived need,” the authors write.<\/p>\n