Recognition and Causal Beliefs of Depression Among Young Adults in a Semi-Urban Malaysian Community and its Association with Help-Seeking Behaviour  

Oleh:

Ismail, Siti Irma Fadhilah ; Jan, Naing KO Noor

Jenis: Article from Proceeding
Dalam koleksi: The International Symposium on Social Sciences (TISSS) and Hong Kong International Conference on Education, Psychology and Society (HKICEPS) at Hongkong, December 2013, page 655-662.
Topik: Depression; Recognition; Causal beliefs; Help-seeking; Mental Health Literacy
Fulltext: Hong Kong-Conference 105.pdf (417.25KB)

Isi artikel

Introduction: Depression constitutes a significant and growing worldwide problem. In Malaysia, it is the second leading burden of disease among females and fourth among males. While there is now a wide range of possibilities to identify and treat depression, the treatment gap is still significant. One of the main factors that can affect this unmet need for support is lack of mental health literacy or differences in illness conception between the lay public and service providers. The current study examined conceptualization of depression in a community-based sample of young adults in an urban community in Malaysia, focusing on recognition and causal beliefs and its association with help-seeking. Methods: A cross sectional study was conducted among 420 young adults who were selected through random sampling of household addresses. Face-to-face interviews were conducted to investigate the recognition rates and causal belief attributes towards depression. Socio-demographic and other individual variables which may affect help-seeking were also collected. Results: Correct recognition of depression was low (4.5%) although most participants recognized it as some form of mental illness (54.3%). Overall, participants followed a biopsychosocial based model to describe depression and its possible causes. Recommended help-seeking generated by the sample were namely specific mental health care, biomedical care, self-help approaches, seeking help from friends and family and seeking spiritual guidance from religious leaders. Both socio-demographic and mental health literacy variables were associated with different types of help-seeking behaviour. Higher level of education, diagnosis of a common mental disorder and having a psychological causal attribution of depression were significantly associated with recommending specific mental health care. Biological and environmental causal attributions were significantly associated with biomedical care for depression. Discussion: The clinical and service implications of these results are discussed as well as key areas related to awareness on depression that needs to be addressed in order to improve mental health literacy and help-seeking rates.

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