Abstract:

Background: The literature on mental illness demonstrates inadequate to moderate knowledge and negative attitudes of mental illness among the general population and also indicates that people often have stigmatizing attitudes towards mental illness.

Objectives: The objectives of this study was to, Knowledge and Attitudes among Religious Believers on Mental Illness and Mental Health Promotion in Roman Catholic Churches, Nyamagana District Mwanza-Tanzania.

Methods: A quantitative research-based cross section study design was used. Data were collected by means of a self-administered questionnaire. Data analysis was performed using SPSS version 23.0.

Results: The findings of the study showed that 31 where nearly half of the participants 49(48%) have adequate knowledge about mental health illness and promotion, 42(40%) of participants had moderate knowledge whereas 12(12%) of remaining participants were having inadequate knowledge. On study on attitude was 56 where by the majority of participants 79(76.5%) they were having a positive attitude towards mental health illness and mental health promotion while the remaining 24(23.3%) of the participants seems to have negative attitude toward mental health illness and mental health promotion.

Conclusion: Religious believers at Roman Catholic churches in Mwanza had inadequate to moderate knowledge and negative attitude towards mental health and their promotion. However some of the participants have adequate knowledge and positive attitude towards mental health, this study results should not been generalized to the whole population as the study uses small number of sample size.