Influencing factors of attitudes toward seeking professional help for mental illness among Korean adults

Subin Park, Mina Jeon, Yeeun Lee, Young-Mi Ko and Chul Eung Kim

International Journal of Social Psychiatry, 2018, vol. 64, issue 3, 286-292

Abstract: Objectives: Identifying predictors of psychological help-seeking attitudes is essential to improve access to needed mental health services. We investigated factors – particularly Big Five personality traits – that affect attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help for mental illness among Korean adults. Methods: A total of 654 participants aged 15–54 years were recruited through an online panel survey. Help-seeking attitudes for mental illness were measured by the Attitudes Toward Seeking Professional Psychological Help Scale (ATSPPH), and personality traits were measured by the Big Five Personality Inventory-10. Results: Multivariate analyses showed that female gender, history of psychiatric diagnosis, agreeableness and openness to experience were significantly associated with positive attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help for mental illness. Conclusions: These findings suggest that specific personality traits should be considered when developing strategies to promote positive attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help. Further research using a representative community sample is needed to generalize our findings.

Keywords: Help-seeking behavior; personality; mental health services; South Korea (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:socpsy:v:64:y:2018:i:3:p:286-292

DOI: 10.1177/0020764018760952

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