Development of the PICMIN (picture of mental illness in newspapers): instrument to assess mental illness stigma in print media

Abstract

PICMIN instrument allows comparison among countries and different studies over time.

“Schizophrenia” in the Australian print and online news media

“…The proportion of stories coded as stigmatizing (46.0%) was higher than previous work by Rukavina et al, (2012), who found rates from 28.8% to 38.6% using the same coding protocol (PICMIN) in Croatian, Czech, and Slovak media samples. Five story features independently predicted higher levels of stigma.…”

“…A manual was developed that enabled each story to be coded on multiple features: (1) word count, (2) news outlet, (3) referenced country or countries, (4) metaphoric versus non-metaphoric use of "schizophrenia" (using criteria developed by Magliano, Read, & Marassi, 2011), (5) presence of any reference to crime, (6) presence of any reference to violence (coded for homicide or attempt, suicide or attempt, assault, other violence, or none), (7) whether a "schizophrenic" person was identified as a victim or perpetrator of violence, (8) the gender of any person identified as "schizophrenic", (9) the age of any person identified as schizophrenic (coded as older adult [30+], young adult [18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29], adolescent [13][14][15][16][17] or child [<13]), (10) whether illicit drugs or alcohol use was mentioned, and (11) whether the story as a whole was stigmatizing, neutral, mixed, or destigmatizing (coding instructions from Rukavina et al, 2012).…”

“…Second, the study includes online as well as print media reports for the first time. Third, it examines stigma and metaphorical use of the term "schizophrenia" using recently developed systematic coding procedures (Magliano et al, 2011;Rukavina et al, 2012). Fourth, it examined a new potential correlate of stigma in news media reports, namely whether the report referred to domestic or foreign events.…”

“…A recently developed system for assessing mental illness stigma in print media (PICMIN: Rukavina et al, 2012) codes media reports as stigmatizing if they are based on unsubstantiated myths about mental illness, emphasize the social dysfunctions it causes, or link it to violence, aggression, and crime. For instance, news stories that link mental illness to substance use could be stigmatizing if they sensationalize it or associate it with criminality or social deviancy.…”

Representation of illness in Familial Amyloidotic Polyneuropathy Portuguese Association newspaper: A documental study

“…Media represent an important means to disseminate information about diseases, treatments, and available resources. However, not all images displayed by the media are correct, often inducing erroneous and stigmal beliefs in the community about people with certain diseases and influencing the illness representation of the person living with the disease (Collin & Hughes, 2011;Drazic & Caltabiano, 2012;Holland, 2012;Rukavina et al, 2012). In the case of FAP, as an hereditary disease with a strong psychosocial impact, it is important to perform an analysis of the news published by the association representing the interests of the persons living with it.…”