5.01 Assignment

5.01: History of Psychological Disorders

In two paragraphs, answer the following reflection questions thoroughly:
1. How does culture affect the identification and treatment of psychological disorders? Be sure to define culture and provide an example in your response.
2. Explain one strategy to reduce the stigma associated with seeking treatment for a psychological disorder.

Culture plays a huge part in society and for people as a set of beliefs. Culture helps set up standards and expectations for people under that certain culture. This also can have effects on psychological disorders and the identification of them. Each culture can have different responses and reasons for a disorder. For example, in one culture, a person might be told a disease like depression is only an imaginative state of mind, and that they don’t really have an illness. Under this impression, the person probably wouldn’t seek any help which could lead them down a bad path. With this view, also comes another perspective from another culture. Some cultures will look at depression as a medical condition, and urge the people to seek help in order to combat the depression. Each culture and their beliefs play a large role in which groups seek medical help for disorders, or even identify them in the first place.
One strategy to help reduce stigma for seeking treatment is education. The media and social networks all spit out a bunch of information that may not always be correct. Things are very opinionated these days, so these opinions that are created can easily catch on and become generally accepted when in reality it’s not even true. Educating yourself properly can give you the proper information and not what society thinks. If you have a psychological disorder, you should seek help from it. It does not matter what other people think about it because you are helping yourself. Your mental health is more important than the opinions and rumors of others. Properly learn about the disorder you have, and find out the ways or people to use to help combat it. People who have schizophrenia aren’t freaks who live in spooky mental asylums. Most of these people with disorders are just like us, and most of the time you probably wouldn’t even notice right away a person has a disorder. The stigma surrounding seeking help for mental disorders should not be an issue because it is just someone who wants to work on bettering themselves and combating whatever they are going through.