Depression Stigmas Through the Lens of News in Two Cultures: A Suggestion for Theoretical Approaches

• In Event: Depression, Mental Illness, Mental Health Communication

Abstract

Several theoretical frameworks have guided stigma research to examine how and why people would activate stigma-related thoughts when contracting external stimuli, such as media content. However, little evidence has demonstrated how likely media content is to contribute to such a stigma activation process as external stimuli, especially for depression. A content analysis with news articles (N = 488) published in two major newspapers in the United States and South Korea explored (1) the likelihood of potential stigma-cued news production in the cases of two countries and (2) the comprehensiveness of the operationalizations of primary theories applied to stigma research. The findings suggest the superiority of the stigma communication model due to its comprehensive ability to diagnose the existence of stigma cues over the attribution and framing theories. The present study also raised a question about the mixed nature of operationalizations of the attribution and framing theories and the applicability of the two theories to media-content research for stigmatization.

Authors

• Hyang-Sook Kim, Towson University

• Mun-Young Chung, Pennsylvania State U

• Emily Gear, St. Norbert College