A Film: 'Breaking the Stigma' An evidence-based approach to combat stigma around mental health struggles in academia

Purpose Academics are more likely to suffer from mental health disorders such as depression and anxiety yet are less likely to seek treatment. Stigma is one of the highest ranked barriers to help-seeking for mental health problems. Strikingly, however, there is limited data on interventions to improve mental health outcomes in academia by decreasing mental health-related stigma despite the prevalence and impact of mental health issues on academic performance and lifestyle. Design Here we report a study conducted by Dragonfly Mental Health (DMH) at the University of California Berkeley in the Molecular and Cell Biology Department to assess the effectiveness of first-person narratives in decreasing mental health stigma. For this study, personal stories of 6 local faculty with lived experience of mental health struggles were shown in a short film during three separate divisional retreats. The audience members were then anonymously surveyed after the screening. Results The screening of the film was deemed beneficial by an overwhelming majority of participants, both with respect to reducing stigma and by fostering conversations about mental health culture. Implications This data suggests that sharing faculty stories is a powerful mechanism to reduce stigma, promote more open communication, and foster change in academic culture around mental health issues.
This document is part of the Book of Abstracts of the ReMO 2022 Conference that was organized within the framework of COST Action CA19117 - "Researcher Mental Health".