Wonderful counselor? An exploratory study of religious coping methods and self-stigma toward seeking psychological help among Christian college students

Current trends indicate young people are experiencing mental health problems with increasing frequency and severity, yet many do not seek formal help for their problems. Self-stigma is a known barrier to help-seeking, particularly among young people. Religious coping has been identified as a unique form of coping; however, research examining the relationship between religious coping and help-seeking is limited. This study explored relationships between positive (PRC) and negative (NRC) religious coping, self-stigma toward help-seeking, distress, and help-seeking preferences within a sample of 369 religious college students. Results showed that gender was related to receipt of counseling, but not self-stigma or distress. Race/ethnicity was found to be associated with NRC. Students who identified as Asian were found to use somewhat more NRC than students who identified with other race/ethnicity categories. Major was associated with self-stigma and PRC. Hierarchical multiple regression results indicated willingness to seek help from formal sources and take care of problems on one's own predicted self-stigma; no such relationship was found in relation to informal helpers. NRC was found to significantly predict distress, and PRC predicted lower levels of self-stigma. On average, participants endorsed willingness to seek help for multiple problems from many sources with relatively low levels of distress and NRC. Clinical implications of findings and areas for future research are also discussed.