I’ve been reading a lot of literature these past few weeks, and like jesminka said, to tell the story of bipolar as a mental illness. I had to become an EXPERT on this disease.
I found a website for a journal that publishes specifically on mental illness in the Asian region called: Asia-Pacific Psychiatry .
Here are some excerpts that I think I can use in my research.
About stigma
The term “stigma” is etymologically derived from the Greek language, with the original meaning of an imprint of a shameful characteristic in the body. Stigma of mental illness has been described as especially pervasive and severe in Chinese population (Yang & Kleinman, 2008). The strong stigma in MDD patients has adverse effect on interpersonal relationship, quality of life, treatment seeking, and treatment adherence (Gaudiano & Miller, 2013; Kelly & Jorm, 2007; Sedlackova et al., 2015). The stigma of MDD thus constitutes a considerable public health problem. Discovering the risk factors of stigma may be a critical pathway for the development of public strategies to reduce stigma in patients with this disorder.
https://sci-hub.se/https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/appy.12260
One very important question is what kind of factors influence the likelihood of a more positive or more negative attitude towards mental illness. Several studies have addressed this issue (e.g.Link, 1987; Jorm et al., 2005). One core factor identified as influencing attitudes towards mental illness is the familiarity with mental disorders. People who are more familiar with mental illness, through learning or personal experience (e.g. affected friends), are less likely to have prejudices and to discriminate against individuals concerned, and experience less negative emotions when faced with this topic (e.g. Angermeyer & Matschinger, 1996; Corrigan et al., 2001). Familiarity can result from direct contact with affected individuals but also from perceived similarities between oneself and another person.
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0020764008092410?src=getftr&entityId=https%3A%2F%2Fidp.ubc.ca%2Fopenathens&journalCode=ispa
Face’ and schizophrenia in China
To illustrate how the experience of stigma is interwoven with loss of face and moral standing, we discuss two stigmatized conditions – schizophrenia and AIDS – in China. Sociopolitically, China’s delay in passing a national mental health law that clearly delineates the legal rights of people
with mental illness and guarantees access to treatment(Shan, 2007) contributes to negative stereotyping, anticipated devaluation, and discrimination reported by people with schizophrenia across multiple life domains (Yang et al., 2007). Yet the traditional viewpoint that cultivation of restraint is integral to moral character further shapes how mental illness stigma is felt. In Confucian thought, one must learn to control oneself before exerting social influence (Lau, 1984). Partly due to public beliefs in China that people with mental illness act dangerously and unpredictably (Phillips & Gao, 1999), we propose that such persons are viewed as not fully cultivated and thus incompetent to participate in social life. People with psychiatric illness are thought to exhibit a ‘moral bankruptcy’ thatrelegates them to a moral level of not fully ‘adult’ status. Etiological beliefs of mental illness further assign a moral‘defect’ to sufferers and families (Yang, 2007); popular Chinese beliefs imply that having mental illness in this lifetime entails moral wrongdoing in a prior life (Stafford, 1995). That people with schizophrenia are not regarded as fully competent morally is depicted by suicide surveys in rural China not counting such individuals (Wu, 2005)
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277953608001445?via%3Dihub
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