The recognition of mental health disorders and its association with psychiatric scepticism, knowledge of psychiatry, and the Big Five personality factors: an investigation using the overclaiming technique

Abstract

The present study examined the general public's ability to recognise mental health disorders and this ability's association with psychiatric scepticism, knowledge of psychiatry, and the Big Five personality factors. A total of 477 members of the British general public completed an overclaiming scale, in which they were asked to rate the degree to which they believed 20 mental health disorders (of which five were foils designed to resemble real disorders) were real or fake. Participants also completed a novel scale measuring psychiatric scepticism, a single-item measure of knowledge of psychiatry, and a measure of the Big Five personality factors. Results showed that participants were significantly more likely to rate foils as fake disorders than real disorders. In addition, the difference between real and foil ratings was significantly predicted by knowledge of psychiatry, psychiatric scepticism, and the Big Five personality factors of agreeableness and openness to experience. These results are discussed in relation to the overclaiming technique as a novel method to study mental health literacy.

Individual difference factors and beliefs in medical and political conspiracy theories

“…The results demonstrated strong support for a monological conspiracy belief system: belief in one conspiracy theory leads to belief in another conspiracy theory (Swami et al ., ; Wood et al ., ). The regression analyses showed that demographic factors, personality factors and attitude factors significantly contributed to the variance in belief in political conspiracy theories.…”

“…Self‐esteem was negatively correlated with belief in both political and medical conspiracies, supporting hypothesis 1B, however it was not a significant predictor of belief in either conspiracy type. This is in keeping with previous findings (Goertzel, ; Swami et al ., ).…”

“…CTs : This consisted of 20 statements of conspiracy theories either chosen from previous conspiracy belief scales (i.e. Generic Conspiracist Beliefs Scale, Brotherton, French & Pickering, ; Psychiatric Skepticism Scale, Swami, Persaud & Furnham, ). Half were political because they involved action by a government, and half were medical because they involved action by the medical or pharmaceutical industry.…”

“…Conspiracy theories (CTs) are usually referred to as a set of beliefs where the cause of an event is thought to be due to a secret plot by multiple people working with a clear goal in mind, (Sunstein & Vermeule, ). It is generally agreed that conspiracy theories form part of a monological belief system: people adopt a conspiracist worldview tending to accept or reject all types of conspiracy theories (Goertzel, ; Swami, Coles, Stieger et al ., ; Wood, Douglas & Sutton, ). Sunstein and Vermeule () suggested that belief in conspiracies are a means for people who feel powerless or disadvantaged, to explain events that are difficult to conceive of, such as terrorist acts (Sullivan, Landau & Rothschild, ; Uscinski & Parent, ).…”

The association between contact and intellectual disability literacy, causal attributions and stigma

“…Pettigrew & Tropp, ; Angermeyer et al ), personality (e.g. Swami et al ) and stereotypes (e.g. Corrigan & Watson, ).…”