Reexamining the Relationships Among Dementia, Stigma, and Aging in Immigrant Chinese and Vietnamese Family Caregivers

Abstract

Prior literature emphasizes that Asian

“Tangled wires in the head”: older migrant Chinese's perception of mental illness in Britain

“…The evidence for this observation can be located in their use of 'ngóh' ('I'), and 'ngóh ge' (my). As in the other cultures, the diseases were associated with normal ageing (Chan, 2010;Ikels, 1998;Jones, Chow, & Gatz, 2006;Liu, Hinton, Tran, Hinton, & Barker, 2008). For example:…”

“…In non-western cultures, mental illness was thought to be caused by an unhappy life (CMHA, 2009), imbalance of Yin (too much cold) and Yang (too much heat) (Zhang, 2007;Cretchley, Gallois, Cheneny & Smith, 2010), and aloofness (Littlewood, 1988). Elsewhere, mental illness was thought to be caused by bad family (Liu, Hinton, Tran, Hinton & Barker, 2008), thinking too much (Liu, Hinton, Tran, Hinton & Barker, 2008), 'excessive thinking' or 'thinking too hard' (Yang, Phillips, Lo, Chou, Zhang & Hopper, 2010, p. 836). Dementia was identified as a 'mind stealer' (Ikels, 1998, p. 257).…”

“…It carried deep stigma of fear and shame for the sufferers and their families (Littlewood, 1988;Ikels, 1998;Burr & Chapman, 2004;Lee, Lee, Chiu & Kleinman, 2005; Collins, Johnston, Fang, Fung, Kwan & Lo, 2006;Zhan, 2006;Yang, 2007;Liu, Hinton, Tran, Hinton & Barker, 2008;Blignault, Ponzio, Rong & Eisebruch, 2008;Yang & Kleinman, 2008;CMHA, 2009;Gallois, Cheneny & Smith, 2010;Chan, 2010;Yang, Phillips, Lo, Chou, Zhang & Hopper, 2010;Olafsdottir & Pescosolido, 2011;Liu, Ma & Zhao, 2012). For example, mental illness was purported to be caused by bad nerves and bad genes in the family (Blignault, Ponzio, Rong & Eisebruch, 2008).…”

“…The hereditary nature of mental illness was an 'inborn stigma' (Goffman, 1968, p. 45), which implicated the family as incompetent for carrying bad genes. This stigma contaminated the whole family and rendered it a bad family (Liu, Hinton, Tran, Hinton, & Barker, 2008). In the context of schizophrenia, Yang, Phillips, Lo, Chou, Zhang & Hopper (2010) reported that it was regarded as a 'mindsplit-disease' (qing shen fen lie zheng) (p. 836), and as a result of 'taking things too hard' or 'excessive thinking' (xiang bu kai).…”

Higher Incidence of Deteriorated Mental Health in Older People Being Mistakenly Labeled as Dementia: A Two-Year Consecutive Community-Dwelling Study in Shanghai, China

“…'Lao-nian' means old age and 'chi-dai' means dull witted, mentally slow, or demented. In China, 'lao-nian chi-dai' is not only the name of disease, but also an insulting language, which highlight the stigma attached to dementia and the tendency to label some older people as having dementia even without a medical diagnosis of dementia (Liu et al 2008). In Chinese culture, stigmatized people and their family members experience a 'diu lian' (loss of face) that is perceived individually as shame and guilt and socially as a loss of status and respect (Yang 2007).…”