Mental Health Awareness is a great initiative to help people to understand and care for people who are struggling with mental illness. It also provides opportunities for fundraising, community outreach and awareness events. Many national organizations like Mental Health America and National Alliance on Mental Illness hold campaigns during this time to promote awareness and support for those suffering with mental health issues.
However, it is important to recognize that raising awareness does not necessarily lead to action and that awareness is not enough on its own. This is because the same process that leads people to report more symptoms of mental health problems – improved recognition and overinterpretation – can also lead to a vicious cycle, with people over-pathologising any negative psychological experiences as being signs of mental health issues.
This is called the “prevalence inflation hypothesis”, and it needs to be empirically tested, ideally through research trials using ecological momentary assessments to measure symptom frequency and duration in individuals who are exposed to different awareness-raising efforts. It would also be helpful to test this in adolescents, who are particularly susceptible to the overinterpretation effects of awareness-raising and may be more likely than adults to opt out of these efforts (e.g. through parental disapproval).
It is vitally important that we continue to raise awareness, and that we continue to fight for better funding and provisions for mental health services – both of which are currently lagging behind other sectors. But it is equally important that we recognise that awareness alone cannot solve the problem of mental health stigma, and that we channel our efforts into action, rather than just more and more awareness.