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Attitudes of case managers toward people with serious mental illness
- Authors:
- MURRAY Megan G., STEFFEN John J.
- Journal article citation:
- Community Mental Health Journal, 35(6), December 1999, pp.505-514.
- Publisher:
- Springer
Negative attitudes toward people who have serious mental illnesses held by mental health professionals threaten the effectiveness of psychiatric treatment. In this American study, attitudes held by case managers working within the public sector were investigated. The results showed a complex interplay among client level of functioning, type of case, management approach, case management philosophy, and attitudes. Among other findings, intensive case managers held more authoritarian attitudes that did their supportive case manager counterparts.
Making us crazy: DSM - the psychiatric bible and the creation of mental disorders
- Authors:
- KUTCHINS Herb, KIRK Stuart A
- Publisher:
- Constable
- Publication year:
- 1999
- Pagination:
- 305p.,bibliog.
- Place of publication:
- London
Used by doctors and therapists all around the country, the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders is the closest thing America has to a bible of mental illness. Currently in its fourth edition, the DSM (as it's commonly called) classifies more than 200 disorders and their symptoms, from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder to Generalized Anxiety Disorder and everything in between. In so doing, the DSM applies the language of mental illness to everyday behaviour, transforming ordinary reactions to life's vicissitudes into billable pathology. The authorshave used 15 years of studying the DSM to produce a lengthy diatribe against its ever-growing list of psychiatric disorders and their overly inclusive symptoms, including bad handwriting, impulsive shopping sprees, and reckless driving. The DSM, they contend, is most influenced by the needs of the insurance industry; every illness comes with its own diagnostic code, widely used for insurance claim forms. Moreover, its choices of which disorders to include and exclude are widely influenced by social prejudices as well as special interests. Given the DSM's list of diagnostic criteria, it is possible to classify almost anyone with objectionable views or behavior that deviates from social norms as "crazy." But in doing so, any mental-health professional would be acting irresponsibly by ignoring the behavior's context--the one factor a reference such as the DSM cannot quantify.
Social context and social worker's judgement of mental disorder
- Authors:
- KIRK Stuart A., et al
- Journal article citation:
- Social Service Review, 73(1), March 1999, pp.82-104.
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
Examines biases in American social workers' assessment of antisocial youths based on the responses of students to clinical case vignettes describing youths engaging in antisocial behaviour. Respondents were to judge whether the described youth had a psychiatric or mental disorder. The contents of the vignettes were manipulated to suggest either internal dysfunction or a normal response to a difficult environment as the cause of the antisocial behaviour. Contrary to the claims of the critics, respondents generally appropriately distinguished, based on contextual information, between disordered and nondisordered youth. However, a minority of students did appear to display bias, primarily in the direction of underdiagnosis of disorder.
Mental health care in the community: an analysis of contemporary public attitudes towards, and public representations of, mental illness
- Author:
- HANNIGAN Ben
- Journal article citation:
- Journal of Mental Health, 8(5), October 1999, pp.431-440.
- Publisher:
- Taylor and Francis
- Place of publication:
- London
Public tolerance of, and non-discrimination towards, people with mental health problems are key factors on which success in achieving the goal of community mental health care depends. This paper tests Thomas Scheff's sociological theory of mental illness through a critical review of recent U.K literature on the subject. The review suggests that negative representations predominate in the media, while a significant minority of the U.K public seem to possess negative attitudes towards people with mental health problems and their care and social participation in the community.