A U-M analysis of the media’s coverage of depression, anti-depressant drugs and related issues over the past 15 years shows a significant shift in how newspapers and magazines portray mental health problems.

Instead of describing depressive illnesses in terms of specific symptoms and medical terms, as they did when the era of Prozac began in the late 1980s, the printed news media are now far more likely to depict women’s mental issues in relation to gender-stereotyped roles, such as marriage, motherhood, and menopause. But during the same time, descriptions of depression in men have not shifted in the same way.

The new findings, made by researchers at the University of Michigan Depression Center, show that gender stereotypes increasingly pervade popular media discussions of mental illness.

From women’s magazines to the health section of the daily paper, the study shows a shift toward the "medicalization" of deviation from women’s traditional roles, and the increasing description of mental illness in emotional, not medical, terms. Meanwhile, men’s depressive illness was increasingly described in terms connoting work, aggression or athletics.

These findings surprised the study’s lead author, Jonathan Metzl, M.D., Ph.D. Even though the 1980s and 1990s were a time when women’s roles in society were firmly rooted in both the workplace and the home, the media’s coverage of women’s mental health focused increasingly on the latter.

"We thought for sure that we’d find lots of articles about how these drugs helped women balance home and family, and describing them rushing off to a high-paying job," says Metzl, a psychiatrist. "But that depiction was not anywhere near as common or as powerful as the stereotype of the woman as the mother and wife. Meanwhile, at a time when men were reportedly getting in touch with their feelings, men’s roles as fathers or husbands — or even men’s emotions — received nowhere near as much coverage as did the ‘depression’ of not performing on the job or the playing field."

The researchers logged how many standard depression symptoms were mentioned in a representative sample of 261 non-business articles in U.S. magazines and papers between 1985 and 2000. The researchers compared how often terms related to depression were couched in gender-neutral language, compared to gender-specific language related to marriage, friendship, aggression, sex, body image, work, age, and menstruation or PMS.

The researchers found that the use gender-specific language to describe depression has been increasing, particularly in regard to women. The result is a popular culture environment in which both patients and doctors should be aware that they may perceive depression and mental health in light of gender norms, Metzl says.

For example, a woman with undiagnosed depression may recognize some of her own symptoms in a magazine article about another woman whose depression interfered with her marriage, and who got help from medication. But a woman whose marriage is on the rocks for reasons other than depression may read the same article and perceive that the medication could help her, when in fact it probably won’t.

"On the one hand, depression is under-diagnosed and under-treated, and the media can help people recognize depression in themselves or their loved ones," says Metzl. "But on the other hand, there are many other things that could be at work and not merit a prescription."

He concludes, "In an age of massive media coverage and ads, doctors and patients need to be aware of the cultural context of depression, as well as its biological basis, so they can have a more knowledgeable discussion about information contained in ads and news articles — whether or not their visit ends in a prescription."

For more information:

The University of Michigan Depression Center
http://www.med.umich.edu/depression