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Mental Illness And Media Analysis

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The discussion between how mental illnesses is correlated heavily throughout the media and criminal justice system is one that has been longly debated by individuals in the field, both among scholarly and entry-level. The portrayal of mental illness through media-based resources often times tends to misrepresents or fails to completely understand the complexity of what it is like to live with the effects of mental illness, such as the severity, and different stages the illness may escalate from. Instead, many examples shown of mental illness, both in films, t.v shows, commercials, and news focus on the extremities of the illness, and the effects it can have on individuals suffering, such as committing horrendous crimes, acts of terror on friends …show more content…

Many individuals with mental illness(es) face prejudice, because of this ignorantly popular assumption, and suffer from disadvantages such as making friends, socializing without being questioned about their mental stability or noting uncomfortable body language of their company, job stability, being patronized by family, and, generally, defamation of character. A study conducted by Mental Health, School of Nursing, Midwifery & Social Work exhibited the correlation between the media portrayed of mental health, and the derogatory wordage used for them, “Negative stereotypes presented in the media may contribute to the stigma associated with mental illness. People’s attitudes towards the mentally ill are initially influenced and subsequently maintained in part by the frequent media presentation of negative stereotypes of mental illness. This could result in social rejection of individuals with mental illnesses.” (Murphy, Fatoye, & Wibberley, …show more content…

Of course, this causes issue to such a broad archetype of mental illness, as there is a wide spectrum of mental illnesses, and although some symptoms and signs are similar, there is always some vastly different area in which distinction between them is created. There is a common misconception of terms in the psychology community being interchangeable although they may a vastly different meaning, such as sociopath, psychopath, bipolar,

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