sane or insane
'SANE OR INSANE?' To understand what something is, we should also have a clear understanding of what it is not. Charactering an object having components of the usual does not necessarily mean that it is what one describes it to be. To be characterized as usual it should also be not unusual.
Following this analogy ,a normal person should not be only describes by characteristics that constitute their normalcy, but also by the characteristics that make that person not abnormal.
This is psychology's main concern regarding understanding and studying psychological behavior. Through socialization and the natural course of human development, it is quite easy to adapt to society's norms and tendencies, making it easy to identify sane or normal behavior.
However, identifying behaviors that are insane or abnormal are not as easily done, mainly because the society's benchmarks on such behaviors are still unclear. One thing I think David
Rosenhan's experiment showed is how difficult it is to tell the sane from the insane. An interesting account of this particular arguement in psychology is presented in the journal article titled "On Being Sane In Insane Places" by David Rosenhan. Rosenhan explores the inadequacies of the processes and protocols in addressing psychological disorders in psychiatric institutions. The journal article also provides recommendations on possible reforms to address such problems. Rosenhan discussed in his article various problems in psychiatric evaluation and treatment. He did this by conducting an experiment in twelve various psychiatric institutions across America where eight volunteers, who had no clincially proven psychological disorders, nor any kind of disorder at all, admitted themselves. The volunteers were known as
"pseudopatients" and all pretended to hear their own voices, trying to suggest that they had symptoms of schizophrenia, a psychological disorder generally characterized by episodes of psychotic behavior. The pseudopatients acted as normal as possible once admitted to the institution, other than hearing the voice in their heads, all other details and backgrounds were not altered, so as to test the evaluation process of the institution they were admitted to. They were also asked to write a daily journal and keep track of events inside the institution. Rosenhan wasn't only interested in showing the problem of misdiagnosis, or to make the doctors look like they didn't know what they were doing, he was trying to show the problems attached to a label and the depersonalization that happens in a mental institution. I saw the depersonalization after reading the chapter Lauren Slater wrote. The doctors and other workers at the hospital treated the patients like they were diseased without seeing that there was a real person behind all those symptoms. The patients were not stupid or oblivious just because they were suffering from a mental illness or perceived as insane. The label of an illness put on a patient like schizophrenic, stays with him or her and he or she is viewed as that disease, so every action that patient takes is somehow related to that disease according to the staff and doctors at the mental institution. The doctors and nurses failed to see that Rosenhan was actually sane, because they looked at everything he did and turned it into something to match his label. Even though all the pseudopatients were released, they were said to be "in remission", because the institution may have never really seen them as sane, even though they all were. In the article Rosenhan writes about the experience of one pseudopatient who had his relatively normal past and childhood turned into a reason for his disorder, because the doctor already thought he was insane. Not to say this is completely the doctors fault, it is their job to find reasons for the symptoms. I found one of the most interesting parts was after the experiment was over, Rosenhan told the institution he would send more pseudopatients and the institution claimed to have found fourty-one of his patients, when Rosenhan actually sent no one So these fourty-one patients may have been insane and the institution could not tell. Rosenhan's experiments caused the mental institutions to look at how they were operating and from Lauren Slater's own experiment obviously they did change some things.
Slater learned that psychiatry today is much different than it was in Rosenhan's day. Slater was not admitted to the institutions like Rosenhan and the other pseudopatients were ,and that was a very big differnce. Slater was also diagnosed with a different disorder called depression as opposed to the schizophrenic diagnosis Rosenhan and others received. I found it odd that
Slater, Rosenhan and the pseudopatients all had the same symptoms, but were diagnosed differently.I think when Rosenhan did his experiment schizophrenia was a more commonly diagnosed disorder like depression is today. Slater was treated much more humanly; the doctors didnt treat her like a walking disease. These few differences Slater showed how the institutions have changed today. Rosenhan was trying to show more than the difficulties of diagnosing a condition, and that was whether or not the patient was sane or insane.
Following this analogy ,a normal person should not be only describes by characteristics that constitute their normalcy, but also by the characteristics that make that person not abnormal.
This is psychology's main concern regarding understanding and studying psychological behavior. Through socialization and the natural course of human development, it is quite easy to adapt to society's norms and tendencies, making it easy to identify sane or normal behavior.
However, identifying behaviors that are insane or abnormal are not as easily done, mainly because the society's benchmarks on such behaviors are still unclear. One thing I think David
Rosenhan's experiment showed is how difficult it is to tell the sane from the insane. An interesting account of this particular arguement in psychology is presented in the journal article titled "On Being Sane In Insane Places" by David Rosenhan. Rosenhan explores the inadequacies of the processes and protocols in addressing psychological disorders in psychiatric institutions. The journal article also provides recommendations on possible reforms to address such problems. Rosenhan discussed in his article various problems in psychiatric evaluation and treatment. He did this by conducting an experiment in twelve various psychiatric institutions across America where eight volunteers, who had no clincially proven psychological disorders, nor any kind of disorder at all, admitted themselves. The volunteers were known as
"pseudopatients" and all pretended to hear their own voices, trying to suggest that they had symptoms of schizophrenia, a psychological disorder generally characterized by episodes of psychotic behavior. The pseudopatients acted as normal as possible once admitted to the institution, other than hearing the voice in their heads, all other details and backgrounds were not altered, so as to test the evaluation process of the institution they were admitted to. They were also asked to write a daily journal and keep track of events inside the institution. Rosenhan wasn't only interested in showing the problem of misdiagnosis, or to make the doctors look like they didn't know what they were doing, he was trying to show the problems attached to a label and the depersonalization that happens in a mental institution. I saw the depersonalization after reading the chapter Lauren Slater wrote. The doctors and other workers at the hospital treated the patients like they were diseased without seeing that there was a real person behind all those symptoms. The patients were not stupid or oblivious just because they were suffering from a mental illness or perceived as insane. The label of an illness put on a patient like schizophrenic, stays with him or her and he or she is viewed as that disease, so every action that patient takes is somehow related to that disease according to the staff and doctors at the mental institution. The doctors and nurses failed to see that Rosenhan was actually sane, because they looked at everything he did and turned it into something to match his label. Even though all the pseudopatients were released, they were said to be "in remission", because the institution may have never really seen them as sane, even though they all were. In the article Rosenhan writes about the experience of one pseudopatient who had his relatively normal past and childhood turned into a reason for his disorder, because the doctor already thought he was insane. Not to say this is completely the doctors fault, it is their job to find reasons for the symptoms. I found one of the most interesting parts was after the experiment was over, Rosenhan told the institution he would send more pseudopatients and the institution claimed to have found fourty-one of his patients, when Rosenhan actually sent no one So these fourty-one patients may have been insane and the institution could not tell. Rosenhan's experiments caused the mental institutions to look at how they were operating and from Lauren Slater's own experiment obviously they did change some things.
Slater learned that psychiatry today is much different than it was in Rosenhan's day. Slater was not admitted to the institutions like Rosenhan and the other pseudopatients were ,and that was a very big differnce. Slater was also diagnosed with a different disorder called depression as opposed to the schizophrenic diagnosis Rosenhan and others received. I found it odd that
Slater, Rosenhan and the pseudopatients all had the same symptoms, but were diagnosed differently.I think when Rosenhan did his experiment schizophrenia was a more commonly diagnosed disorder like depression is today. Slater was treated much more humanly; the doctors didnt treat her like a walking disease. These few differences Slater showed how the institutions have changed today. Rosenhan was trying to show more than the difficulties of diagnosing a condition, and that was whether or not the patient was sane or insane.