Ignorance Breeds Ignorance

The BBC reports that in a study of 500 young people conducted by Great Ormond Street Hospital, almost half could not name a single mental health condition. Dr Jon Goldin, a consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist at Great Ormond Street, said the results were both worrying and surprising. But are they? Are the results really that much of a surprise?

I confess; before it was suggested to me that Mr Man may be suffering from Schizophrenia, which in turn led to my own research, I had no idea what Schizophrenia was. Like most people I think I thought it was a split personality – I had no idea about delusions or hallucinations. Lack of knowledge probably explains the strange reactions I have had from others once they have realised my “plight”.

Ignorance is rife at all ages. No wonder then that many of the Google searches that lead to my blog are strange questions such as: “is a schizophrenic capable of love?”

Dr Jon Goldin continues: “This ignorance is probably one of the reasons why for too long now there has been a stigma attached to living with a mental health condition.” And I couldn’t agree more. People living with mental health problems are presumed to be unpredictable, violent, aggressive; you name it – anything other than ordinary people living with an illness, and these beliefs are largely fed by various types of media. How many people ask the question: “Is a person with Multiple Sclerosis capable of love?”? Or “Are people with Cancer violent?”? How many times do we see the headline “Murderer was Dyslexic”? Never. Does this mean that people with Dyslexia don’t commit murder? Of course not, but we wouldn’t dare stigmatise these people in such a way.

It is admirable that Great Ormond Street is responding to this need of information by adding a new section to their website Children First, dealing with mental health issues; but just as with this blog, I fear that only those who have an interest in mental health issues will access that area of the site, and believe it or not, there are still some children without internet access or the privacy to read information on such a sensitive issue.

Young people are often influenced by the attitudes of their parents and teachers before they reach their teens, and prejudices can already be ingrained by then. There needs to be more education for the general public and especially for parents and those who work with young people – firstly to avoid passing on such prejudices, and secondly because mental illness often first develops in adolescence and needs to be recognised for what it is. Mr Mans illness remained undetected throughout his teens, as his depressive behaviour was dismissed as being “normal teenage” behaviour.

No, there is no surprise at the lack of knowledge about mental illness by young people. Ignorance breeds stigma and further ignorance. Only knowledge breeds understanding and acceptance.