Portraying mental illness and drug addiction as treatable health conditions: Effects of a randomized experiment on stigma and discrimination

McGinty, Emma E.; Goldman, Howard H.; Pescosolido, Bernice A.; Barry, Colleen L.

doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2014.12.010

Cited by 198 publications

(208 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…In addition to the direct impact of this mental illness on people's lives, present and former depression affect individuals' (later) life outcomes indirectly by the stigma depression inflicts (McGinty et al, 2015;Schwenk, Davis, & Wimsatt, 2010;Whitley & Campbell, 2014). A frequently reported consequence of depression stigma is the discrimination the (formerly) depressed undergo in their search for suitable unobserved differences in human capital rather than causal evidence of unequal treatment.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

First depressed, then discriminated against?

Baert

Visschere

Schoors

et al. 2016

Social Science & Medicine

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Each year a substantial share of the European population suffers from major depression. This mental illness may affect individuals' later life outcomes indirectly by the stigma it inflicts. The present study assesses hiring discrimination based on disclosed depression.To this end, between May 2015 and July 2015, we sent out 288 trios of job applications from fictitious candidates to real vacancies in Belgium. Within each trio, one candidate claimed to have become unemployed only recently, whereas the other two candidates revealed former depression or no reason at all for their unemployment during a full year. Disclosing a year of inactivity due to former depression decreases the probability of getting a job interview invitation by about 34% when compared with candidates 2 who just became unemployed, but the stigma effect of a year of depression is not significantly higher than the stigma effect of a year of unexplained unemployment. In addition, we found that these stigmas of depression and unemployment were driven by our male trios of fictitious candidates. As a consequence, our results are in favour of further research on gender heterogeneity in the stigma of depression and other health impairments.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

First depressed, then discriminated against?

Baert

Visschere

Schoors

et al. 2016

Social Science & Medicine

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“…Research suggests "addiction" disease and recovery discourse evokes sympathy and humanizes people who use drugs (Desmon and Morrow 2014;McGinty et al 2015). It can also provide some people who use drugs-who in the past have been institutionalized, sterilized (Kaye 2012), or killed (Berlant 2007)-with access to resources and treatment they may find beneficial.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Is There “Hope for Every Addicted American”? The New U.S. War on Drugs

Stone

2017

Social Sciences

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The U.S. has been waging a War on Drugs for the last forty years. But in the mid-2010s, a series of reforms have rejected this militant approach. How did these policies manage to break through a gridlocked Congress? What is the nature of these reforms, and what are their political implications? Using critical discourse analysis, I demonstrate that a new policy framework of "addiction recovery" defines the political crises of the opioid epidemic, the failure of the War on Drugs, and mass incarceration in terms of disease, attributing Drug War injustices to prejudice against "addiction," rather than a constellation of institutional racism, sexism, nativism, and economic exploitation enacted through drug policy. I conclude that characterizing recent reforms as a decisive break with the War on Drugs obscures the ways in which drug policy continues to perpetuate injustice by offering a personal, rather than political, solution in the "hope" of recovery.

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“…Fortunately, in our study, a number of health professionals recognized the powerlessness of substance use dependence and the importance of remaining non-judgmental when caring for substance users. Viewing substance use dependence as a medical condition deserving of treatment is important not only because it shifts the blame or responsibility away from the substance user but also because the perception that a stigmatized condition is treatable has been found to be associated with reduced stigmatization [44].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Because the lady has HIV.' (Laura, age 44) Similarly, Tim reported being treated differently in a dental practice:…”

Section: Fear and Apprehensionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…And then, on top of that, telling me about that little baby as if they mean to say, 'You should think long and hard about your HIV and AIDS.' (Nikki, age 44) Two other participants reported receiving almost rudimentary treatment whereby local anaesthesia was not administered and, in their opinion, should have been. Another participant spoke of being inadequately counselled after receiving his diagnosis:…”

Section: Unnecessary Referrals and Refusal Tomentioning

confidence: 99%

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