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Articles

Vol. 2 No. 1 (2014)

An Exploration into the Personal Impact that TV Documentaries which Feature Mental Health have on Viewers with Lived Experience of Mental Health Conditions

Submitted
July 20, 2014
Published
2014-08-30

Abstract

This paper adopts a phenomenological approach to researching the personal impact of mental health documentaries on people with lived experience of mental health issues. An underlying passion to challenge the societal stigma of mental health sufferers directed the researcher to explore mental health from the perspective of those whose voices do not currently influence how they are portrayed to the audience. Four global themes emerged from the interviews; sensationalisation of mental health in documentaries, a lack of understanding of mental health disorders differing from the participants own, a fear of societal judgement, and only showing the most severe cases of mental health rather than a spectrum of severity. To adhere to the restrictions associated with this paper, of the four significant themes, two were selected for a fuller exploration due to their close relationship and to allow mental health sufferers to voice their experiences and conquer their suppression.

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