Awareness as wellness: Examining disparities in mental health care

Abstract

Mental health encompasses an individual’s emotional, psychological and social well-being. In the United States, addressing mental health is an emergent concern among young adults. This paper investigates how stigma and ethnicity influence the likelihood of young adults seeking professional help for a mental health condition. To garner understanding regarding young adults’ attitudes about mental health and help-seeking behaviour, individuals from the Gen Z and millennial generational cohorts were interviewed regarding the management of their mental health and their comfort level with seeking help for a mental health condition. Insight from the interviews helped to inform the development of a model that examined factors influencing the consumption of mental health services. The model was tested using individuals from the Gen Z and millennial cohorts (n = 476). Findings indicate that stigma mediates the relationship between individuals experiencing a mental health condition such as anxiety and intentions to seek mental health services. Heightened feelings of anxiety were also related to efforts to self-treat an illness by consuming products such as alcohol and recreational drugs. Ethnicity was a key factor in terms of the intention to seek help for a mental health condition, with white people more likely than black people to seek help for a mental health condition such as anxiety. Finally, mental health literacy was positively related to intentions to seek mental health services. Recommendations are offered for how marketing and communication strategies can be designed to reach targeted groups, including groups of colour, to help address the mental health crisis.