mental disorder

Examples of mental disorder in the following topics:

• Mental Health

  • Common disorders that affect a person's mental health can range from attention deficit disorder (ADD), which is often easily treatable and not-disabling, to severe schizophrenia, which can interfere with day-to-day life processes.
  • Mental health describes a level of psychological well-being or the presence/absence of a mental disorder.
  • Thus, the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders varies widely by social class.
  • This lithograph illustrates the eight mental health disorders that were thought to be prominent in England during the early-19th century: dementia, megalomania, acute mania, melancholia, idiocy, hallucination, erotic mania, and paralysis.
  • Since 1837, many of those disorders have been erased from medical textbooks or modified in light of changing social norms.

• Psychological Theories of Deviance

  • One case study of a psychological theory of deviance is the case of conduct disorder.
  • This childhood disorder is often seen as the precursor to antisocial personality disorder.
  • According the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders–IV (the professional manual listing all medically recognized mental disorders and their symptoms), conduct disorder presents as aggressive and disrespectful behavior.
  • Take, for example, the case of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
  • According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders – IV, the professional manual listing all medically recognized mental disorders and their symptoms, conduct disorder presents as aggressive and disrespectful behavior.

• Institutionalized Children

  • It has also been argued that institutionalized individuals become psychologically more prone to mental health problems.
  • However, there are a number of institutions specializing only in the treatment of juveniles, particularly when dealing with drug abuse, self-harm, eating disorders, anxiety, depression or other mental illness.
  • Deinstitutionalization is the process of replacing long-stay psychiatric hospitals with less isolated community mental health service for those diagnosed with a mental disorder or developmental disability.
  • Deinstitutionalization can have multiple definitions; the first focuses on reducing the population size of mental institutions.
  • Many state hospitals have mental health branches, such as the Northern Michigan Asylum.

• The Experience of Illness

  • Mental illness contains a diverse factors that contribute to the health of the mind.
  • Specific illnesses known as mental illnesses include major depression, generalized anxiety disorder, schizophrenia, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, to name a few.
  • Statistics show that more and more people are being diagnosed with mental disorders.
  • The National Institute for Mental Health reports that over 40 million adults are diagnosed with an anxiety disorder in a given year, accounting for 18 percent of the population.
  • Other disorders that are prevalent are ADHD (4 percent), mood disorders (9.5 percent) and and autism (1 percent, but quickly rising).

• The Labeling Approach

  • Mental illnesses are socially constructed illnesses and psychotic disorders do not exist.
  • Scheff published Being Mentally Ill.
  • Scheff challenged common perceptions of mental illness by claiming that mental illness is manifested solely as a result of societal influence.
  • Criteria for different mental illnesses, he believed, are not consistently fulfilled by those who are diagnosed with them because all of these people suffer from the same disorder.
  • A mental disorder or mental illness is a psychological pattern, potentially reflected in behavior, that is generally associated with distress or disability, and which is not considered part of normal development of a person's culture.

• Homelessness

  • Those at a higher risk of becoming homeless include veterans, people suffering from substance abuse or mental disorders, and the unemployed.
  • Individuals with substance abuse problems and mental disorders represent a large number of the homeless.
  • In the United States, 22 percent of the homeless have serious mental illnesses or are physically disabled, and 30 percent have substance abuse problems.
  • Homeless people who suffer from substance abuse or mental illness often lack access to effective treatment options, a condition exacerbated by deinstitutionalization in the 1960s and 1970s.
  • Prior to the 1960s, individuals with mental illness were frequently committed to long-term institutions, but deinstitutionalization closed these institutions in favor of community-based treatment.

• Change in Household Size

  • Residents of group homes usually have either a chronic mental disorder or a physical disability that prevents them from living independently.

• Social Class

  • Such examples include higher rates of morbidity and mortality for those in lower occupational classes than those in higher occupational classes, and the increased likelihood of those from ethnic minorities being diagnosed with a mental health disorder.

• Social Class and Health

  • Such examples include higher rates of morbidity and mortality for those in lower occupational classes than those in higher occupational classes, and the increased likelihood of those from ethnic minorities being diagnosed with a mental health disorder.

• Labeling Theory

  • People who believe in hard labeling believe that mental illness does not exist.
  • It is merely deviance from the norms of society that people attribute to mental illness.
  • Thus, mental illnesses are socially constructed illnesses and psychotic disorders do not exist.
  • People who believe in soft labeling believe that mental illnesses do, in fact, exist.
  • Unlike the supporters of hard labeling, soft labeling supporters believe that mental illnesses are not socially constructed but are objective problems.