Mental Media And Social Media

The article presented in Computers in Human Behavior presents social media and mass media in general, in a very ruthless and cruel light. The article focuses around how social media users trivialize OCD, and how they do not even take the time to truly understand what mental illnesses are and how millions of people suffer from them everyday. The article concluded that the flippant use of trivial language, such as “That’s so OCD” or “#OCD” for non-clinical settings may not drastically change social media users’ perceptions of the disease. However, the use of trivial language can lead to negative impressions of those users (Myrick, Pavelko).
Understanding how social media shapes perceptions of mental illness is important because those with a mental

Social media can actually be a tool capable of informing the public of important issues and bringing people together to make a change. More people than ever before are talking about mental health online. Whether through blogs, videos or tweets, candid conversations about mental illnesses can be found across the spectrum of social networks people interact with on day-to-day basis. According to a survey performed by Time to Change, a website dedicated to raising awareness and sharing stories about mental health situations, forty-seven percent of people aged twenty-one and under said they find it easiest to talk about their mental health problems online

A recent systematic review of mass media interventions for reducing mental health-related stigma revealed that, among the twenty-two included studies, the longest post-intervention follow-up period was nine months. The systematic review recommended that further research needed to be conducted to understand the effects of mass media interventions on children and adolescents, and that post-intervention outcome assessments extend beyond six months. In addition, although most major anti-stigma campaigns utilize social media and social marketing techniques, there are few evaluations of the degree to which social media reduces mental illness-related stigma and related variables (Cianfrone et