(PS6-D99) Help-seeking for Youth Mental Health Problems: Cross-cultural Comparisons Between Taiwan and U.S. Mothers

Background: Asians and Asian Americans underutilize mental health services relative to Whites and other racial minority groups (Sue et al., 2012). Cultural factors play a role in a person’s help-seeking behaviors (e.g., Kasahara-Kiritani et al., 2018). For example, face concern and subsequent feelings of shame and embarrassment are related to reductions in Asian Americans and Asian families seeking mental health services (e.g., Gee et al., 2020). However, mental health professionals are not the only source of help for Asian Americans and Asian families experiencing mental health problems. Individuals holding different cultural values may have different preferred types of help-seeking, such as professional help from medical doctors or informal help from friends and family. Therefore, the aim of this study was two-fold: (a) to compare help-seeking tendency using a cross-cultural sample, and (b) to examine which cultural values predicted different sources of help for mental health problems.

Method: The sample included 612 mothers from the United States (M = 36.11, SD = 9.02) and 597 mothers from Taiwan (M = 36.18, SD = 8.14). Participants rated their cultural values using Asian American Values Scale-Multidimensional (Kim et al., 2005) and Loss of Face Scale (Zane & Yeh, 2002). Participants were randomized into two vignette groups: a 15-year-old youth with internalizing symptoms and a 6-year-old youth with externalizing symptoms. After reading the vignette, participants rated help seeking tendency and their preferred sources of help. Multinomial logistic regression was conducted to examine whether country and cultural values predicted different types of help seeking, using the three-category dependent variable: (a) mental health professionals (reference group), (b) medical doctors, and (c) friends/family.

Results: Compared to U.S. mothers, Taiwan mothers reported less likely to seek help for the youth described in the vignette (Cohen’s d = -.33). After adjusting for vignette type, U.S. mothers reported more likely to seek medical doctors for help (OR = 1.61, 95% CI [1.17, 2.23]) compared to mental health professionals, than Taiwan mothers. Country of origin did not show a significant effect on predicting preference of informal help from friends/family. Regarding cultural values, after adjusting for vignette type and country, higher scores on emotional self-control predicted both seeking medical doctors for help (OR = 1.34, 95% CI [1.12, 1.60]) and seeking informal support from friends/family (OR = 1.57, 95% CI[1.29, 1.90]) compared to seeking help from mental health professionals. Other cultural values were not related to different sources of help.

Discussion: Consistent with previous findings, Asian participants (i.e., Taiwan mothers) were less likely to seek help for mental health problems. Furthermore, cultural differences exist in a person’s preferred source of help. Individuals who value emotional self-control, a traditional Asian value, likely perceive seeking help from mental health professionals as a weakness, because one should be able to control emotions or mental well-being effectively by themselves. Future directions include examining the mechanism between cultural values and different sources of help seeking.