IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/socpsy/v58y2012i5p470-476.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Nigerian home video boom: Should Nigerian psychiatrists be worried? Lessons from content review and views of community dwellers

Author

Listed:
  • Olayinka Atilola
  • Funmilayo Olayiwola

Abstract

Background: Media depiction of sufferers of mental illness is a widely viewed source of stigmatization and studies have found stigmatizing depictions of mental illness in Nigerian films. With the recent boom in the Nigerian home video industry, there is a need to know how often Nigerians are exposed to films that contain scenes depicting mental illness and how much premium they place on such portrayals as reflecting reality. Aim: To assess the popularity of Nigerian home videos among Nigerian community dwellers and the frequency of their exposure to scenes depicting mental illness. Methods: A semi-structured questionnaire was designed to obtain socio-demographic data and to find out how often respondents see scenes depicting ‘madness’ in home videos, as well as their views about the accuracy of such depictions from the orthodox psychiatry point of view. Current home videos available in video rental shops were selected for viewing and content review. Results: All 676 respondents had seen a Nigerian home video in the preceding 30 days: 528 (78%) reported scenes depicting ‘mad persons’; 472 (70%) reported that the scenes they saw agreed with their own initial understanding of the cause and treatment of ‘madness’. About 20% of the films depicted mental illness. The most commonly depicted cause was sorcery and enchantment by witches and wizards, while the most commonly depicted treatment was magical and spiritual healing by diviners and religious priests. Conclusions: Nigerian home video is a popular electronic media in Nigeria and scenes depicting mental illness are not uncommon. The industry could be harnessed for promoting mental health literacy.

Suggested Citation

  • Olayinka Atilola & Funmilayo Olayiwola, 2012. "The Nigerian home video boom: Should Nigerian psychiatrists be worried? Lessons from content review and views of community dwellers," International Journal of Social Psychiatry, , vol. 58(5), pages 470-476, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:socpsy:v:58:y:2012:i:5:p:470-476
    DOI: 10.1177/0020764011408544
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0020764011408544
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0020764011408544?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Pablo Ronzoni & Nisha Dogra & Olayinka Omigbodun & Tolulope Bella & Olayinka Atitola, 2010. "Stigmatization of Mental Illness Among Nigerian Schoolchildren," International Journal of Social Psychiatry, , vol. 56(5), pages 507-514, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sanja Totic & Dragan Stojiljković & Zorana Pavlovic & Nenad Zaric & Boris Zarkovic & Ljubica Malic & Marina Mihaljevic & Miroslava Jašović-Gašić & Nadja P. Marić, 2012. "Stigmatization of ‘psychiatric label’ by medical and non-medical students," International Journal of Social Psychiatry, , vol. 58(5), pages 455-462, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:socpsy:v:58:y:2012:i:5:p:470-476. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.