Framing of stigma communication by laypeople in Hong Kong and Australia: Pragmatics and morality

Health stigma is a widely understood phenomenon that impacts both the wellbeing of recipients of health care and the trajectories of their illness journeys. As stigma is a societal issue that results in largely negative consequences for the individuals who are members of stigmatised groups, solutions and understanding must also be located at a societal level. Although mental health has received much research coverage, it is equally necessary to address general health stigma in a time when primary care has risen sharply in prominence, as stigmatising processes and beliefs could have a strongly negative impact on the uptake and likely success of primary care efforts. Problematically, theorising around general health stigma is less well-developed in Asian cultures than is that around mental health stigma and this may ultimately impede the development of practical, local efforts to address stigma and its consequences in a multicultural and multilingual society such as Hong Kong. This talk draws on social and cultural psychologies and sociolinguistics to present a qualitative examination of stigma communication by laypeople from Australia and Hong Kong. Key comparisons involve the hesitancy and discomfort of Australian respondents in contrast to the Hong Kongers, but also the loci of moral judgements across cultures. Results suggest that: a) stigmas in Hong Kong have clearly defined loci (e.g., contagious conditions, mental health, and morally salient conditions); and b) that interpretations of stigma and stigma processes are sharply differentiated between Hong Kong and Western societies. In particular, the focus of morality in the identification of stigma targets and the way in which interpretations are shaped is discussed. Connections are drawn between stigma communication and classical psychological theories, where there is evidence of both consonance and dissonance with the observed stigma communication.