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Statewide mental health training for probation officers: improving knowledge and decreasing stigma

BACKGROUND: The large and growing number of probationers with mental illnesses pose significant challenges to the probationer officers who supervise them. Stigma towards mental illnesses among probation officers is largely unstudied and the effectiveness of training initiatives designed to educate p...

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Autores principales: Tomar, Nikhil, Ghezzi, Marilyn A., Brinkley-Rubinstein, Lauren, Wilson, Amy Blank, Van Deinse, Tonya B., Burgin, Stacey, Cuddeback, Gary S.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5688049/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29143153
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s40352-017-0057-y
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author Tomar, Nikhil
Ghezzi, Marilyn A.
Brinkley-Rubinstein, Lauren
Wilson, Amy Blank
Van Deinse, Tonya B.
Burgin, Stacey
Cuddeback, Gary S.
author_facet Tomar, Nikhil
Ghezzi, Marilyn A.
Brinkley-Rubinstein, Lauren
Wilson, Amy Blank
Van Deinse, Tonya B.
Burgin, Stacey
Cuddeback, Gary S.
author_sort Tomar, Nikhil
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: The large and growing number of probationers with mental illnesses pose significant challenges to the probationer officers who supervise them. Stigma towards mental illnesses among probation officers is largely unstudied and the effectiveness of training initiatives designed to educate probation officers about mental illness is unknown. To address these gaps in the literature, we report findings from a statewide mental health training initiative designed to improve probation officers’ knowledge of mental illnesses. A single-group pretest posttest design was used and data about stigma towards mental illnesses and knowledge of mental illnesses were collected from 316 probation officers. Data were collected prior to and shortly after officers viewed a series of educational training modules about mental illnesses. RESULTS: Officers’ knowledge of mental illnesses increased and officers demonstrated lower levels of stigma towards persons with mental illnesses as evidenced by scores on a standardized scale. CONCLUSION: Mental health education can help decrease stigma and increase knowledge of mental illnesses among probation officers. More research is needed to assess the impact of these trainings on probationers’ mental health and criminal justice outcomes.
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spelling pubmed-56880492017-12-01 Statewide mental health training for probation officers: improving knowledge and decreasing stigma Tomar, Nikhil Ghezzi, Marilyn A. Brinkley-Rubinstein, Lauren Wilson, Amy Blank Van Deinse, Tonya B. Burgin, Stacey Cuddeback, Gary S. Health Justice Short Report BACKGROUND: The large and growing number of probationers with mental illnesses pose significant challenges to the probationer officers who supervise them. Stigma towards mental illnesses among probation officers is largely unstudied and the effectiveness of training initiatives designed to educate probation officers about mental illness is unknown. To address these gaps in the literature, we report findings from a statewide mental health training initiative designed to improve probation officers’ knowledge of mental illnesses. A single-group pretest posttest design was used and data about stigma towards mental illnesses and knowledge of mental illnesses were collected from 316 probation officers. Data were collected prior to and shortly after officers viewed a series of educational training modules about mental illnesses. RESULTS: Officers’ knowledge of mental illnesses increased and officers demonstrated lower levels of stigma towards persons with mental illnesses as evidenced by scores on a standardized scale. CONCLUSION: Mental health education can help decrease stigma and increase knowledge of mental illnesses among probation officers. More research is needed to assess the impact of these trainings on probationers’ mental health and criminal justice outcomes. Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2017-11-15 /pmc/articles/PMC5688049/ /pubmed/29143153 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s40352-017-0057-y Text en © The Author(s). 2017 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
spellingShingle Short Report
Tomar, Nikhil
Ghezzi, Marilyn A.
Brinkley-Rubinstein, Lauren
Wilson, Amy Blank
Van Deinse, Tonya B.
Burgin, Stacey
Cuddeback, Gary S.
Statewide mental health training for probation officers: improving knowledge and decreasing stigma
title Statewide mental health training for probation officers: improving knowledge and decreasing stigma
title_full Statewide mental health training for probation officers: improving knowledge and decreasing stigma
title_fullStr Statewide mental health training for probation officers: improving knowledge and decreasing stigma
title_full_unstemmed Statewide mental health training for probation officers: improving knowledge and decreasing stigma
title_short Statewide mental health training for probation officers: improving knowledge and decreasing stigma
title_sort statewide mental health training for probation officers: improving knowledge and decreasing stigma
topic Short Report
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5688049/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29143153
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s40352-017-0057-y
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