Psychopathology continued..
Even though Pinel taught to respect the mentally ill, the idea of them being less than human persists well into the 21st century. An experiment done by David Rosenhan showed that mental hospitals are, in his words, “dehumanizing.” As he described his experience in the video he tells us of how no one communicates with you. Even the orderlies that are supposed to be there to care for the patients don’t speak to you. When they did it was only for about 6 minutes a day. To me, I find it ridiculous that in this day and age we still hold on to bigoted ideas. Just like any other differences in people, mental disabilities do not mean that a person is somehow not human or less than human. I feel that we have made great strides to be accepting to all people, but we are still not quite there.
What defines mental illness? Is it just based on what society thinks and defines who the society wishes to reject? Rosenhan’s experiment brought up these questions of how we label psychological disorders as well. He admitted himself to a metal hospital with the symptoms of “hearing voices” and promptly dropped his symptoms to see if anyone would notice a difference. Like we talked about in previous chapters, being human means we look for patterns. It’s no surprise then that when Rosenhan dropped his act in the hospital, even routine mundane behavior was misinterpreted as a symptom. Clinicians were able to “discover” the cause of his disorder from his seemingly normal life (459). We see what we expect to see. This fact, however, doesn’t mean that mental disabilities don’t exist, and are just figments of what our society considers “normal.”
The video was fairly consistent with the text, and did a great job describing psychological disorders in general in the short time given. Our text goes into greater detail and describes many other mental disorders within each major group. Like for anxiety disorder there are many classifications within that umbrella term. For example: Panic disorder, phobias, OCD, and post traumatic stress disorder (463-464). Other major disorders are mentioned in the book like: somatoform disorders, dissociative disorders, and personality disorders (468,486).
I really like this video because mental disability is something that I have had to personally deal with. Two of my close friends are schizophrenic. It was interesting to learn more about the subject and what they have to go through on a daily basis. I also find the differences between the two of them interesting. Let me give you their names for clarification: Matt and Isaac Miller. They are both from the same family which is an example of how, in some ways, schizophrenia is passed down through genes (484). Their family has eight kids, but curiously only two of them developed (or were diagnosed with) positive schizophrenia. Why is that? Not only is that strange, but the differences between Matt and Isaac are obvious in how they dealt with it. Isaac from an early age recognized that something was wrong. He has told me that he would look at the wall and see dead, bleeding bodies. Whether his parents believed him or not, they refused to take him to the hospital. Being proactive, Isaac sought help, admitted himself to the hospital and was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Matt Miller, on the other hand, refuses to believe that he is schizophrenic yet has all the tell tale signs of the disorder. In fact, he will sometimes refuse to take his medication and plunge in delusion. One of his delusions is that he talked with Carl Sagan (a long- dead astronomer) to plot against the Russians. I believe that he can’t tell the difference anymore between reality and hallucination. What caused the difference in two schizophrenic people from the same family? The answer, I believe, is their environment and how they were treated growing up (481). Another reason I believe Matt is worse is because of his addiction to cigarettes and use of marijuana. These have caused him to be over-stimulated with dopamine, which is already out of balance in his body due to the nature of his schizophrenia (483).
To be honest, who among us has not been curious about mental disorders. They have that sort of creepy sense of self-recognition, and they illuminate the dynamics of our personalities (453).
What defines mental illness? Is it just based on what society thinks and defines who the society wishes to reject? Rosenhan’s experiment brought up these questions of how we label psychological disorders as well. He admitted himself to a metal hospital with the symptoms of “hearing voices” and promptly dropped his symptoms to see if anyone would notice a difference. Like we talked about in previous chapters, being human means we look for patterns. It’s no surprise then that when Rosenhan dropped his act in the hospital, even routine mundane behavior was misinterpreted as a symptom. Clinicians were able to “discover” the cause of his disorder from his seemingly normal life (459). We see what we expect to see. This fact, however, doesn’t mean that mental disabilities don’t exist, and are just figments of what our society considers “normal.”
The video was fairly consistent with the text, and did a great job describing psychological disorders in general in the short time given. Our text goes into greater detail and describes many other mental disorders within each major group. Like for anxiety disorder there are many classifications within that umbrella term. For example: Panic disorder, phobias, OCD, and post traumatic stress disorder (463-464). Other major disorders are mentioned in the book like: somatoform disorders, dissociative disorders, and personality disorders (468,486).
I really like this video because mental disability is something that I have had to personally deal with. Two of my close friends are schizophrenic. It was interesting to learn more about the subject and what they have to go through on a daily basis. I also find the differences between the two of them interesting. Let me give you their names for clarification: Matt and Isaac Miller. They are both from the same family which is an example of how, in some ways, schizophrenia is passed down through genes (484). Their family has eight kids, but curiously only two of them developed (or were diagnosed with) positive schizophrenia. Why is that? Not only is that strange, but the differences between Matt and Isaac are obvious in how they dealt with it. Isaac from an early age recognized that something was wrong. He has told me that he would look at the wall and see dead, bleeding bodies. Whether his parents believed him or not, they refused to take him to the hospital. Being proactive, Isaac sought help, admitted himself to the hospital and was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Matt Miller, on the other hand, refuses to believe that he is schizophrenic yet has all the tell tale signs of the disorder. In fact, he will sometimes refuse to take his medication and plunge in delusion. One of his delusions is that he talked with Carl Sagan (a long- dead astronomer) to plot against the Russians. I believe that he can’t tell the difference anymore between reality and hallucination. What caused the difference in two schizophrenic people from the same family? The answer, I believe, is their environment and how they were treated growing up (481). Another reason I believe Matt is worse is because of his addiction to cigarettes and use of marijuana. These have caused him to be over-stimulated with dopamine, which is already out of balance in his body due to the nature of his schizophrenia (483).
To be honest, who among us has not been curious about mental disorders. They have that sort of creepy sense of self-recognition, and they illuminate the dynamics of our personalities (453).