The impact of bias on mental health care
Backed by EU funding, the 'Intuitive decision making and bias: examination of their role in the initial mental-health intake with ethnically and racially diverse populations' (INTUITION AND BIAS) project looked at the role of intuition and ethnicity in mental health care.Research revealed that when psychology students were of a different ethnic decent than their patients, the outcome of the initial interview was worse than when they were of the same decent.Additionally over 129 interviews conducted with mental health providers demonstrated that intuition impacts decisions made from the initial interview. This is significant as the interview process assesses: the trustworthiness of a patient, how to develop a relationship with the patient, and makes recommendations on diagnosis.Based upon these results, researchers came up with a set of recommendations to ameliorate the role that bias plays in mental health care. Since the completion of the project, researchers have expanded their work to develop models to reduce the significant role of bias in mental health care.This research has inspired other projects that look more closely at the role of bias in other fields of health care. Moreover, researchers are examining how socioeconomic factors may account for differences in health issues across countries.
Keywords
Intuition, bias, mental health care, physician, patient background
