Abstract
Limited or incorrect mental health knowledge has been shown to result in negative attitudes toward mental illness and the seeking of psychological treatment. We endeavoured to investigate university students' beliefs about the etiology and treatment of mental illness. The sample comprised 112 students from the faculties of Law and Engineering of a large South African university. A three-part questionnaire was administered, which consisted of a section on demographic information, a vignette scale measuring the students' choice(s) of etiological factors and treatments for four types of mental illness, and Fischer and Farina's Attitudes Toward Seeking Professional Psychological Help Scale — Shortened Form ATSPPH-SF. The results indicated that the participants viewed stressful events as leading to both depression and substance abuse, chemical imbalance as a cause of schizophrenia, and negative social factors as causing anorexia nervosa. The overall top-rated treatment across the four disorders was professional psychological intervention as chosen by 48% of the participants. The results also indicated a number of significant relationships between etiological and treatment beliefs. The findings are discussed in the context of the literature, and recommendations for future research are made.
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