Abnormality Flashcards
In the ancient period
550 to 330 B.C how did many cultures view mental illness as?
A form of religous punishment or demonic possession.
Persion empire - all physical and mental disorders were considered the work of the devil
In ancient Egypt, India, Greek, China and Rome, how was mental illness categorized?
Treatments?
as religious
treatments: - applying bodily fluids while reciting magical spells (Egypt) and natural therapy such as diet and massages (China and Rome).
5th century B.C.
How did hippocrites treat mentally ill people ?
With techniques not rooted in
religion or superstition — he focused on changing a mentally ill patient’s environment or
occupation, or administering certain substances as medications (Hippocratic Oath).
History of Mental Illness – Middle Ages
The Age of Enlightenment followed the Dark Ages. What did it lead to ?
between the religious
establishment and the emerging sciences.
History of Mental Illness – Middle Ages
The Age of Enlightenment followed the Dark Ages. What did it lead to ?
between the religious
establishment and the emerging sciences.
History of Mental Illness – Middle Ages
During the Middle Ages, the mentally ill were believed to be… ?
possessed or in need of religion.
History of Mental Illness
Post Middle Ages
17th century
madness no longer involved the soul or moral responsibility.
The mentally ill were viewed as insensitive wild animals.
Harsh treatment and restraint in chains was seen as therapeutic, helping suppress the animal passions.
History of Mental Illness
Post Middle Ages
18th century
What persisted into the 18th century? What did it lead to?
Negative attitudes towards mental illness
Lead to stigmatization of mental illness, and unhygenic (and often degrading) confinement of metnally ill individuals.
In the 1840s What did activist Dorothea Dix lobby for?
better living conditions for the mentally ill after witnessing the
dangerous and unhealthy conditions in which many patients lived.
Over a 40-year period, What did Dix successfully persuade the U.S government to fund?
fund the building of 32 state psychiatric hospitals.
Institutionalised care
increased patient access to mental health services,but the state hospitals were often underfunded and
understaffed. Institutional system drew harsh criticism following a number of high-profile reports of poor
living conditions and human rights violations.
Over a 40-year period, What did Dix successfully persuade the U.S government to fund?
fund the building of 32 state psychiatric hospitals.
Institutionalised care
increased patient access to mental health services,but the state hospitals were often underfunded and
understaffed. Institutional system drew harsh criticism following a number of high-profile reports of poor
living conditions and human rights violations.
By the 19th and 20th centuries, the western
world had accepted that?
mental disorders were
similar to medical illnesses.
Modern Period:
When mental assylums began to pop up. What did this lead to?
remedy mental illness using medical experiments that might now be described as torture (patients lost all their rights, Scull):
- Spinning mental patients until they vomited and emptied their bowels was a way researchers tried to “shock people back to sanity”.
-
Electric shock therapy and lobotomies -
where part of a patient’s brain is removed - were tested on inmates
mid 1950s to 1960s
1963
By the mid-1950s to 1960s, a push for deinstitutionalization and outpatient treatment began in many countries, facilitated by the development of a variety of antipsychotic drugs (patients would have a higher quality of life if treated in their communities).
Community Mental Health Centers Act of 1963, The closure of state psychiatric hospitals in the United States - only individuals “who posed an imminent danger to themselves or someone else” could be committed to state psychiatric hospitals.
21st century
21st Century - DSM-IV and previous versions presented extremely high comorbidity (disorders that coexist, e.g., depression and anxiety disorders). In 2013, the APA published the DSM-—5 after more than 10 years of research.
