Illusory Boundaries and Perceived Access to Mental Health Care

This study examined the potential effects of illusory boundaries (in the form of county lines on a map) on distance judgments, specifically distance to mental health care (therapy), perceived accessibility, and ease of travel to the location. Participants were presented with a series of 10 maps. Each map had two pins, one labeled “you are here” and the other labeled “therapy location” with a key on the bottom for reference. Five of the maps contained boundaries between “your location” and the “therapy location” while the other five did not. For each map, participants estimated the distance from “your location” to the “therapy location” on the map, perception of ease of travel to the therapy location, and accessibility of the therapy location. A statistically significant difference was found for perceived accessibility between conditions; when an illusory boundary was present between locations, participants perceived accessibility to be lower than when two locations were within the same county. This research has implications for perception of mental health care accessibility in the context of perceived illusory boundaries.