Defining Mental Illness: The Relationship Between College Students' Beliefs About the Definition of Mental Illness and Tolerance

Abstract

The current study investigated the relationship between college undergraduate students' beliefs about the definition of mental illness and their tolerance toward individuals with mental illnesses. Undergraduate students (N = 102) in courses in the College of Education at a large midwestern university were given a questionnaire designed to determine their beliefs about what constitutes a mental illness along with the Community Attitudes Toward the Mentally Ill questionnaire (CAMI). Significant correlations were found between the breadth of their definition of mental illness and their tolerance toward individuals with mental illnesses. Those students with broad and inclusive definitions of mental illness had more benevolent, less authoritarian, and less socially restrictive attitudes toward individuals with mental illnesses.