What do Howard Hughes, John Nash and Kurt Cobain have in common besides the fact that they were geniuses in their respective ways? They all suffered from mental illness at some point in their lives. However, their personal problems were pushed aside during their prime times in the spotlight. Only after years of struggle did the public learn of their experiences. Although their disorders may have been amplified through news media or movies such as “The Aviator” and “A Beautiful Mind,” the portrayal of their mental illnesses may come off as distorted from reality and even be perceived negatively by audiences.
Stigma has made mental illnesses (and people who have them) notorious. The fear of being labeled mentally ill causes patients to avoid seeking help, perhaps out of fear of humiliation or shame. These frets may seem nonsensical, but they are real. The stereotype of mental illness not only affects those with disorders but also their friends and families. They may inadvertently treat the patient differently, perhaps walking on eggshells around them, or be insensitive, and their behavior can be attributed to the perception they have received through stigma. So, how can we eradicate stigma?
Active Minds is a national organization that develops and supports student-run mental health awareness, education and advocacy chapters on campuses nationwide. The group’s mission is to remove the stigma that surrounds mental illness and create a comfortable environment for open conversation about mental health. The UC Berkeley chapter formed in 2007.
Because awareness is essential to eradicate stigma, this semester was filled with many activities. Andy Behrman, author of “Electroboy: a Memoir of Mania” and a bipolar disorder survivor, was a guest speaker on campus on March 10 during the Mind and Body Awareness Week in collaboration with the Tang Center. He spoke of his experiences with shock therapy and suicide attempts. Active Minds also hosted an art show on the theme of “Dis-Connect” on April 12, where various art forms were utilized to express the views on stigma of mental illness within the community.
But the work is never done. We must continue to spread awareness. Active Minds is currently working with the Health Workers Program to initiate a Mental Health Educational Program in the residence halls where students struggling with mental illnesses can turn for guidance. The co-president of Active Minds facilitated two sections of the DeCal “Understanding Depression,” with psychology department chair Stephen Hinshaw serving as the instructor of record, that focused on personal accounts of depression. Lastly, Active Minds is looking to start a 5K run next semester to raise mental health awareness.
Active Minds was created by people experiencing difficulties with the stigma surrounding mental health for people having difficulties coping with stigma. The first step to solving any issue is to promote awareness, and that is the purpose of Active Minds. Ask, talk, listen. Every voice counts, and only you can make the difference. Break the stigma.
Negeen Farsio is a member of Active Minds on campus.
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How does Active Minds feel about the mass-marketing of SSRIs and atypical antipsychotics, and the widespread damage that seems to have arisen? I’d feel more comfortable with this group if they were more interested in the devastating effects of the use of these substances in juvenile detention centers and mental hospitals, than they are on the impact of “depression” on the average college student.
Frankly, because of what mental illness actually “is,” discussing “stigma” seems futile to me. Someone with bipolar is more likely to be angry and volatile. If I found that someone has borderline personality disorder, I’d avoid them because I wouldn’t want to get vilified by their black-and-white thinking or sucked into their drama. There may be all kinds of things I can call them other than “bipolar victims” or “borderline patients.” Mental illness espouses virtually any kind of deviant behavior. It will never stop being something we need to handle discretely and privately. And frankly, psychiatric abuse is still very real. Think Jordan Nott. Some of the same psychologists who sponsor groups like this have been involved in kicking people off certain college campuses for suicidal behavior or even “suicidal ideation.” Yet this group, Active Minds, concentrates on encouraging widespread and unashamed use of psychiatric services, as if abusive mental health workers or dangerous drugs were not endemic in the fields of psychology and psychiatry.
Does Active Minds take money from pharmaceutical companies? I’d like to know.
The lead editor of DSM-IV (psychology/psychiatry’s bible for decades) has major regrets over its gross shortcomings. The damage to society to date by DSM-IV is about to be repeated on a grander scale with impeding publication of DSM-V.
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/12/ff_dsmv/all/1
“… there is no definition of a mental disorder. It’s b******t. I mean, you
just can’t define it.” said Allen Frances, lead editor of the fourth edition of the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (universally known as the DSM-IV)…”
“… the serious errors in the DSM-IV. “We made mistakes that had terrible consequences,” he says. Diagnoses of autism,
attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, and bipolar disorder
skyrocketed, and Frances thinks his manual inadvertently facilitated
these epidemics—and, in the bargain, fostered an increasing tendency to
chalk up life’s difficulties to mental illness and then treat them with
psychiatric drugs.”
“… descriptive psychiatry also has a major problem: Its diagnoses are nothing more than groupings of symptoms.”
“… Frances warned that the new DSM,
with its emphasis on early intervention, would cause a “wholesale
imperial medicalization of normality” and “a bonanza for the
pharmaceutical industry,” for which patients would pay the “high price
[of] adverse effects, dollars, and stigma.”
clinical psychology: humanity’s second greatest fraud (religion being the greatest, of course)
Those suffering from schizophrenia are 4-7 times more likely to commit violent crimes than the average person.
a) pls substantiate
b) and how likely is the average person to commit violent crime?
http://schizophreniabulletin.oxfordjournals.org/content/24/3/437.full.pdf
“Can shrinks really tell who’s crazy?”
There is certainly some difficulty in diagnosing some borderline cases. However, there are millions of Americans for whom a diagnosis with some mental illness is unambiguous.
Where did you get those numbers? Your statement seems to exclude “those suffering from schizophrenia” from being an average person. Is someone suffering from cancer included in the category of an average person? Yes both groups suffer from a terrible disease and yes both can be an “average person” in many ways but a person such as yourself, which you probably think of as being an “average person” could not possibly understand this.
I took “average person” in a purely statistical sense; i.e., take the number of violent crimes committed, and divide that but the total number of people in a population. If that population is taken to be everyone, the rate of violent crime is smaller then if that population is taken to be those diagnosed with schizophrenia. I did not take “average person” as a reference to a normative person in the sociological sense (e.g. WASP).
Here is the source for the numbers:
http://schizophreniabulletin.oxfordjournals.org/content/24/3/437.full.pdf
–Break the stigma around the mentally ill
Active Minds is a curious organization. While wanting to educate about mental illnesses it promotes, exploits, each stereotype. It is not a technique to admire.
It is one that can teach however:
Read the article, isolate each caricature, stereotype in the article and pledge not to repeat it.
Example in your headline:
Break the “stigma” around “the” mentally ill:
The headline makes two assertions, that there is a “stigma,” and that a “the” mentally ill, a generic “the” mentally ill exists. Any “education” flowing from those assertions is flawed. Some people assert those prejudices, most of us are far too educated to do so.
To test the “lesson” offered in teh headline, place “the” Jews there.
Harold A. Maio, retired Mental Health [email protected]