It doesn’t show up on an x-ray and isn’t as obvious and clear cut as many physical ailments, so people often make the misassumption that mental illness is not a health issue, Cassandra Nichols, director of WSU Counseling and Testing Services said.

“We have a long history of defining mental health issues as spiritual-related issues,” Nichols said, “making it about something else, about their lack of will.”

The stigma surrounding those with mental health issues is a worldwide problem, Bruce Wright, executive director of Health and Wellness Services, said.

“It has little to do with being weak or being lazy,” Wright said, noting that many people view mental health issues as a character defect. “It increases the burden of mental health issues because of the shame associated with that and then it also deters people from getting help.”

According to an article by the Mayo Clinic, some of the effects of stigma can include having fewer work, school or social opportunities; reluctance to seek treatment; bullying, harassment or physical violence; and the idea that one will never be able to improve their situation.

People can perceive those with mental health issues as everything from dangerous and unpredictable to incompetent, or just strange and weird, Wright said. However, he added that the public interacts with people with mental health issues every day without even knowing it.

“The fact of the matter is that mental health issues are really ubiquitous,” Wright said. “If you haven’t had any, then probably someone in your family (does).”

Despite the commonality of mental health issues, only 24.6 percent of adults with mental health symptoms believe “people are generally caring and sympathetic to persons with mental illness,” according to data from 2007, analyzed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 57 percent of adults without such symptoms believed people were usually sympathetic to those with mental illness.

The way media portrays mental health issues often enforces misconceptions and insensitivity, according to both Wright and Nichols.

Television isn’t known for being realistic: girls wake up in full makeup, minimum-wage working characters live in swanky houses, and reality shows are scripted. Some inaccuracy is harmless, like the size Monica’s apartment on “Friends,” (she’s a sous-chef, and they live in New York … ). But what happens when television misrepresents real-life problem, such as mental health?

Psychology faculty member Carrie Cuttler has worked with people suffering from schizophrenia, and said her experience with people having mental health issues differs greatly from what is seen on television.

“One of the most pervasive problems is the sensationalization and misportrayal of individuals, particularly individuals with schizophrenia, as being violent or dangerous, which research does not really substantiate,” Cuttler said.

She said this creates a culture of fear around individuals with mental health issues, which she thinks is harmful, unnecessary and inaccurate.

“I think the issue is broader than that, but I definitely think the media play a role in it,” Cuttler said.

Richard Taflinger, a WSU associate clinical professor, teaches several classes in The Edward R. Murrow College of Communication about the media and particularly television. Television shows have to edit relatable storylines down to a half-hour, and that can make for inaccurate depictions of real-life problems, Taflinger said.

Often in television dramas, people with mental illnesses are often either high-functioning sociopaths depicted as the hero, or low-functioning sociopaths depicted as the villain, he said.

He said the show “Sherlock” is a good example in which the main character’s sociopathic thinking is depicted as a gift that enables him to solve crimes. On the newer show, “Perception,” the main character uses his schizophrenic hallucinations to help him work through mysteries. And then, Taflinger said, there are shows like “Criminal Minds.”

“You find a lot of people with what is defined as a mental illness as villains,” he said. “On crime shows they’re killers, robbers, rapists.”

Cuttler said she remembers seeing a preview for a horror movie a few years back starring a person experiencing mental health issues.

Cuttler said she thought to herself, “Why is this a horror movie? It’s not. This is about a person with schizophrenia.”

In television comedies people with mental health issues are just like everyone — the butt of the joke, Taflinger said. Comedy requires characters to act outside of the normal expected behavior, he said. For example, Sheldon from “The Big Bang Theory” has some sort of mental health issue, possibly sociopathic or slightly autistic, and that unusual behavior is made funny, Taflinger said.

The comedic representation on “The Big Bang Theory” is actually more accurate than criminal or horror-themed media, Cuttler said.

“It shows them as well-rounded people, for the most part, they have a work life and a social life and outside interests,” she said.

Accurate media portrayals and getting the word out about how common these conditions are can help combat stigma, Wright said.

“It does help for prominent people to come forward and talk about themselves or a family member,” he said.

Inaccurate media portrayal of those in the limelight factors into this stigma as well.

“We have a really big focus and kind of voyeuristic glee when we see folks who are mentally ill, especially if they are famous, and we make fun of them and it’s kind of an OK thing to do,” Nichols said, using the media’s coverage of Amanda Bynes as an example. “I don’t know if we’d be making fun of somebody in the same way if there was a physical illness we could point to.”

The way the media treats a celebrity with breast cancer as opposed to one with a mental health problem is “night and day,” Wright said.

“The media sometimes also responsibly talks about things like stigma, put out good information about resources and conditions and so forth but it’s just trumped by the Ebola-izing of people,” he said.

One issue in media and culture is the reduction of people to their mental illnesses, when people are always much more complex, Cuttler said. In light of this, she teaches all of her classes not to use terms like ‘depressive’ or ‘schizophrenic,” she said.

“The person can still be a student and a mother and a wife and a friend and a hard-working employee and a valuable member of society,” Cuttler said. “Just like we wouldn’t say a person is canceric, we say a person has cancer.”

Mike De Felice, King County office of public defense supervising attorney for the Harborview Medical Involuntary Commitment Court, works with people deemed harmful to themselves or others. He said news media only shows a person’s mental illness, not how or why they got the point where they’re shooting at the police.

“When they deteriorate in the community, that’s when people notice them,” De Felice said.

People with mental health issues are depicted as dangerous or violent in media, when actually they’re just a part of a community that needs more resources, he said. After months of lobbying, De Felice said he and other attorneys finally convinced lawmakers to acknowledge the shortage of hospital beds in Washington state, and in January lawmakers approved additional funding for mental health.

“It’s not a problem like alcoholism, where there’s some choice,” De Felice said. “Nobody brought it on, nobody caused it, it just happened.”

Dealing with other peoples’ misconceptions can be difficult, but there are ways to cope with the stigma surrounding one’s illness, according to the same Mayo Clinic article.

Refusing to let stigma create self-doubt, getting treatment, reaching out to trusted individuals for support, and not equating oneself with an illness can help people with mental illness deal with stigma.

When given the right medical care, De Felice emphasized, people with mental health problems can contribute to society just as well as the next guy.