Publications by authors named "James M Ragsdale"

Objective: The purpose of this study was to test the effects of causal explanations, information about treatability, and type of psychiatric diagnosis on how the public reacts to an individual described as having a specific mental illness versus subclinical distress.

Methods: A 5 (mental health condition) × 2 (treatability) × 4 (causal explanation) vignette experiment was embedded in an online survey, followed by assessments of prognostic optimism and desire to maintain social distance from the vignette character. Data were collected, in late 2022, from a probability sample (N=1,607) representative of the U.

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Purpose: Bipolar and borderline personality disorders share similar features, are challenging to differentiate and sometimes co-occur in the same individual. This paper compares people with bipolar, borderline, both or neither, analyzing sociodemographic characteristics, lifetime exposure to stressors, and emotional, social, and physical wellbeing to illuminate differences in life experiences associated with expressing symptoms consistent with bipolar, borderline, or both.

Methods: Data were analyzed from the 2012-13 National Epidemiological Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC-III), N = 36,309.

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The purpose of this study is to explore the experiences of mental health professionals who self-identify as having a mental illness by analyzing how they describe their experiences in their own words. Twelve therapists volunteered to be interviewed for a larger study of working professionals living with mental illness that focused on perceived prejudice and discrimination in the workplace, revealing versus concealing one's mental illness on the job, and how having a mental illness impacts one's identity as a professional. This article reports on how these themes relate to practicing psychotherapists who are typically careful about with whom they share their mental health information.

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