PSYC 301 Lecture Notes - Lecture 27: Mental Disorder, Strange Behaviour, Drapetomania
Document Summary
There are biological markers to link to mental illness, but typically society defines the illness. There is a societal range for what we describe as normal and strange behaviour. The idea of mental illness will be defined by these social differences. It"s constantly evolving: boundaries are fuzzy and get fuzzier with time. Previously considered mental disorders: masturbation, drapetomania: the mental disorder that makes slaves want to flee their owners, dysaethesia aethiopica: the mental disorder that makes them lazy and not work very hard. Are mental disorders universa: to some extent yes. Idea of balloon theory: as we stop taking patients in one place you basically started admitting them into other places (prisons or homelessness) Mental disorders rarely lead to violence and clinical prediction of violence is unreliable. Those with mental disorders are disproportionately more often the victims of crime than those non-mentally ill. There are some that lead to increased violence: alcoholism (alcohol use disorder) and intermittent-explosive disorder.
