Abstract:
Research found that gendered stigma associated with mental health problems played an essential role in shaping public's perceptions about gender and mental illness. Magazines as a widely circulated printed media have long been understudied pertaining to the topic of mental health and mental health issues. This thesis explored the portrayals of mental health issues in four magazines (two men's magazines and two women's magazines) during a ten-year period from 2002-2011 through a content analysis. The current study examined the topics, cause and solution framing, sources cited, discourse type and message cues used in men's and women's magazines. Results indicated that magazines tended to cover general mental health terms such as stress or anxiety rather medically diagnosable illnesses such as depression. While these magazines were most likely to attribute mental illnesses to social causes, self-help was the solution most often proposed. Human interest discourse was more likely to be used than scientific discourse. Finally, magazines were more likely to use challenge code than stigma code in their coverage of mental illnesses. Men's magazines and women's magazines differed primarily from each other in the sources cited and discourse types. Women's magazines seemed to cite more frequently expert sources than men's magazines, especially academic sources. Moreover, women's magazines employed more scientific discourse than men's magazines. Limitations of this study were presented and future research directions were provided.
