Does changing how a person’s mental health condition or addiction is described change care professionals’ stigmatizing attitudes?

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People with mental health problems and/or substance addictions (MHPSA) are stigmatized more than people with physical conditions, including by care professionals. Stigma is considered one of the most important barriers to recovery from these conditions. There is ongoing debate about whether language can exacerbate or diminish stigmatization.

The researchers conducted an experiment examining how four ways of referring to someone with alcohol addiction, drug addiction, depression or schizophrenia related to stigmatizing attitudes among care professionals in the Netherlands. They partially replicated two studies performed in the United States, using surveys with vignettes containing ‘disorder-first’, ‘person-first’, ‘victim’ or ‘recovery’ language. The vignette language conditions were randomly assigned to participants (n = 361).

No significant differences between language conditions were found for any of the vignettes. The researchers interpret these findings as suggesting that subtle differences in language used to refer to people with mental health problems or substance addictions have no effect on stigmatizing attitudes among care professionals in the Netherlands. However, they state that more research is needed to determine the effect of language use on other groups, such as individuals with MHPSA.