Perceived stigma from mental health service providers and its adverse impact on service engagement and recovery among people with mental illness

The present study investigated how perceived stigma from mental health service providers would influence the mental health recovery of people with mental illness. Specifically, this study examined whether perceived stigma from service providers would adversely affect the clinical, functional, and personal recovery of people with mental illness by exacerbating the content and process of self-stigma and service disengagement. A total of 353 people with mental illness completed questionnaires about perceived stigma from service providers, self-stigma content and process, service disengagement, and clinical, functional, and personal recovery. The associations among these variables were analyzed using structural equation modeling and bootstrap analyses. Structural equation modeling showed that perceived stigma from service providers was related to higher levels of self-stigma content and process, which were, in turn, related to greater levels of service disengagement and then lower levels of clinical, functional, and personal recovery. Bootstrap analyses further showed that perceived stigma from service providers had significant indirect effects on clinical, functional, and personal recovery through self-stigma content and process and service disengagement. Our findings show that perceived stigma from service providers may adversely affect mental health recovery through intensifying self-stigma and heightening service disengagement. These findings highlight the importance of mitigating the stigma-related experiences of people with mental illness in order to facilitate their mental health recovery. Copyright © 2023 Global Alliance for Behavioral Health and Social Justice.