Expand Contact Interventions For Mental Illness Stigma:The Mediating Role Of Empathy And Fear Aroused

The stigma of mental illness is an individual’s negative perception and derogatory view of patients with mental illness.At present,the main methods of stigma intervention for mental illness are education and contact,and the form of extended contact is currently proven to be relatively effective.Some researchers have suggested that empathy and fear arousal to patients with mental illness may be important influencing factors in contact intervention.Therefore,this study tested the mediating role of empathy and fear arousal in contact intervention in public stigma attitudes,and expanded the form of contact intervention through video to intervene empathy and fear arousal,thereby reducing public psychology Disease stigma attitude.In Study 1,240 general public were first measured for empathy,fear arousal,and public mental illness stigma attitudes.Through statistical analysis,it is determined:①The relationship between empathy level,fear arousal level and public psychological stigma attitude;②Effectiveness of intervention;③The mediating role of empathy level and fear arousal level in exposure and intervention of public stigma attitude.In the second study,we used self-compiled videos to expand access to intervention materials to intervene in empathy and fear arousal levels,and designed 7 online interactive learning activities of 50-60 minutes each.68 people were selected for intervention and randomized.Measure before and after the intervention and 2 weeks later to explore the overall intervention effect and track the changes in the intervention effect.This study drew the following conclusions:(1)Stigma attitude is significantly positively correlated with the level of fear arousal,and significantly negatively correlated with the level of empathy;fear arousal is not significantly correlated with the level of empathy.(2)The level of empathy and the level of fear arousal play a side-by-side intermediary role in the contact intervention stigma attitude.(3)Self-made videos to expand access to intervention materials can effectively improve the level of public empathy,reduce their level of fear arousal to patients with mental illness,thereby reducing psychological stigma,and have a certain long-term effect.On the whole,the results of this study clarified part of the mechanism of contact intervention on the stigma of mental illness,and provided a set of effective video intervention materials,which provided theoretical significance and practical guidance for improving the overall mental health literacy of the people.