Mental Illness Sociology

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3. Society’s view of the mentally ill
Generally, since mental illness has been discovered, the mentally ill people have generally stigmatized (Fink, 1992). This stigma originates from the medieval times and have been carried through to the modern times (Fink, 1992). In the olden days, people with mental illness were thought of as being possessed by demons although that has changed in the modern times, mentally ill people are still seen as inferior and weak and as responsible for their own fate (Fink, 1992). People who suffered from epilepsy and tuberculosis were characterised with mentally ill people but now those patients no longer suffer this type of stigma (Fink, 1992). Although prejudice against people with mental illness continues to …show more content…
More people are getting all the help and treatment that they need although there are still som black people that believe in witchcraft and demon possession which shows that more awareness still needs to be raised for these people who still believe in these things (Angermeyer & Matschinger, The stigma of mental illness: effects of labelling on public attitudes towards people with mental disorder, …show more content…
The results showed that the attitudes of people did not improve at all but instead they seemed to be getting worse even though they now know a lot more about schizophrenia, their attitudes are just getting worse towards people with schizophrenia because they have that belief that people with mental illness are possessed with demons or that they did something wrong so God is punishing them or even in African homes were there is belief that they did something wrong to upset the ancestors (Angermeyer & Dietrich, Public beliefs about and attitudes towards people with mental illness: A review of people with mental illness: A review of population studies, 2006). When the attitudes of people become so worse towards people with mental illness, the prejudice, discrimination and stigma also becomes worse because in their eyes, the mentally ill person is just becoming worse and worse (Angermeyer & Dietrich, Public beliefs about and attitudes towards people with mental illness: A review of people with mental illness: A review of population studies,
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