Scrolling Through Stigma Experiment: How Negative Comments Affect Adolescents' Perception of Mental Illness

Adolescents who experience mental illness are vulnerable to stigma from society, especially from their peers, because of the condition they experience. Various factors, such as stigma in society and reactions from other peers, can influence adolescents’ views of peers with mental illness. As there is a shift in communication, and most adolescents interact through social media, it is important to know whether online communication through comments on social media can also influence adolescents’ stigmatisation of mental illness. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the effect of exposure to negative comments on adolescents’ stigmatisation of mental illness on social media through Instagram. This study used an experimental quantitative method with a true experimental design type of post-test only control group with a Mann-Whitney (U-Test) testing model. The results of the study showed a significance value of 0.000 (p <0.05) and an r value of -0.539, indicating that there is an effect of exposure to negative comments on adolescents’ stigmatisation of mental illness on social media.