Stigma and How it Affects Teens
My project this year was to compose a presentation about Stigma. This presentation consisted of hours and hours of research, mainly from sources like the NIH (National Library of Medicine), CDC and Healthline. I got this idea because I was thinking about how drastically the pandemic affected many of my peers, but more over why they were apprehensive to talk about this. My mind went to stigma, and I learned that stigma goes much deeper than mental health-it connects to and is driven by racism, prejudice, homophobia, and much more. I wanted to find out why and how this affects teens so much, because I see it happening all around me. I too am victim of it as well. I talked to my friends that have had experience with it, and I got all the numbers from sites about mental health, parenting, the pandemic, and relationships. Then, I tried to compile it in a way that not only educated about stigma, but also educated on how to rid people of stigma, or reduce stigma in a healthier way. I think this is important because although neither stigma nor the project itself is flashy or tangible, stigma is still very real and is worth learning about, even if you feel that you are not exposed to it yourself.
