D. L. Rosenhan's Case Study

The case study done by D.L. Rosenhan was designed to decipher between those who are sane and those who are insane, or in proper terms, determine abnormal vs. normal behavior. Rosenhan also observes how a patient is treated by others once they are labeled mentally ill and how that treatment effects their diagnosis. To classify one’s behavior, psychiatrists and psychologists came up with a continuum. The criteria for determining abnormal vs. normal behavior is as follows: “Context of the Behavior” the pattern of the behavior, “Persistence of the Behavior” how the behavior continues over time, “Social Deviance” occurrence of hallucinations, etc., “Subjective Distress” being unaware of our individual psychological issues, “Psychological Handicap”
In order for Rosenhan to understand whether health professionals are able to determine between a perfectly normal patient and a mentally ill patient, he conducted a study. In this study, he gathered eight people, including himself, from various backgrounds and locations that included five states on both the east and west coast of the United States. The subject’s jobs were the same, they had to make an appointment with the hospital under false names and occupations– not the same one, there were 12 different hospitals. After arriving at the hospital, they had to complain of hearing voices, all using the same few descriptive words for these voices. Every subject was admitted to the hospital except for one who was admitted under the mental illness of schizophrenia. After the patients had been admitted they acted completely normal, showing no symptoms of mental illness. The subjects were responsible for having good behavior in order to be able to be released from the hospital. Every subject took notes of what they were experiencing, which they tried to hide from the staff at first, but their note taking was seen as part of their mental illness and no one thought anything of it. The subjects were all given pills in which they did not take – they