Demographic correlates of attitude toward seeking professional psychological help.

Abstract

Help-seeking orientation was unrelated to social class of origin (based on father's social position) in a total sample of student 5s and for high school 5s and college freshmen considered separately. Jewish 5s tended to express more positive attitudes than Catholics or Protestants. Variables pertinent to the individual's academic life, such as educational level and scholastic major, significantly differentiated attitudes toward seeking professional aid. Correspondence of attitude to education level was independent of 5 age. Thus, the less favorable outlooks of students with less education were not attributable to proximity to parental values or to greater cynicism among newer students. The findings suggest that attitudes toward psychologists and psychiatrists as help sources are not as closely tied to socioeconomic class as has been indicated in earlier sociological studies.

Chinese Students’ Attitudes Toward Seeking Professional Psychological Help

“…Some evidence suggests that students' attitudes toward seeking professional help are related to their educational levels and their majors (Fischer and Cohen 1972;McMichael and Hetzel 1974). All three studies found that college students reported more positive help-seeking attitudes than high school students and that college students in arts and humanities reported more positive attitudes toward help-seeking than those in science and engineering.…”

“…Some researchers have shown that people with higher SES tend to have more positive attitudes toward seeking professional help (Tessler and Schwarts 1972) and they are reportedly more likely to seek help (Figueroa et al 1984), while others found no relationship between social class and help-seeking attitudes (Fischer and Cohen 1972;Lorion 1974). Studies relating SES to actual professional help-seeking behavior have yielded contradictory results (Brill and Storrow 1960;Dixon 1986;Gasquet et al 1999;Saunders et al 1994).…”

Religion, Ethnicity, and Attitudes Toward Psychotherapy

“…These were Recognition of Need (a = .75), Stigma Tolerance (a = .73), Interpersonal Openness (a = .66), and Confidence in Mental Health Practitioners (a = .75). The ATSPPH has previously demonstrated test-retest reliability and low correlations with social desirability (Fischer and Cohen 1972), the ability to discriminate between those who have utilized psychological services and those who have not (Price and McNeill 1992), and has been widely used with a variety of populations (e.g., Brody 1994;Kaminetsky and Stricker 2000;Joyce et al 2009). …”

The structure of attrition during appraisal

“…Variables related to an expressed willingness to label certain symptoms as psychiatric were investigated by Balch (1974) and Yarrow, Schwartz, Murphy, and Deasy (1955). The question concerning whether people seek outside help for their problems is related to studies that investigate various aspects of the decision to seek treatment (Calhoun, Dawes, & Lewis, 1972;Fisher & Cohen, 1972;Kadushin, 1958;Kalis, Harris, Prestwood, & Freeman, 1961;McMichael & Hetzel, 1974). Preferences for different sources of help have been measured by several authors (Dahms, 1969;Michael, 1967;Sieveking & Chappell, 1970); expectancies for different types of help (Johnson, 1973); or attitudes toward different clinic lables (Sieveking & Doctor, 1969).…”