Product Description

Making Us Crazy is a powerful and challenging book which forces us to question the labels which are now commonly imposed on us by the American bible of mental syndromes.'

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #174316 in Books
• Published on: 1999-08-16
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 304 pages

Customer Reviews

A challenge to the idea that all behaviours are "disorders"
Attention all mental health practitioners! Do you strive to be "evidence based" in all that you do? Do you accept only scientific studies as constituting "evidence" on topics of diagnosis and treatment?

Most importantly, do you choose to refer to the DSM-IV (or earlier editions) to make definitive, scientific diagnoses?

Well, read this book to have your blinkers removed! The authors (a professor of social work and a professor of social care) argue persuasively that a large number of the identified behavioural disorders are defined because of political, social and economic reasons, sometimes with no scientific backing at all - sometimes even in direct contradiction to scientific evidence available.

This book however is no "anti-psychiatry" rant. Instead, the authors acknowledge the "reality" of mental illness, and the pain and suffering that it causes to many people and their families.

What they do object to is the increasing "medicalisation" of behaviours which never before have been considered "disorders" and which stigmatises the individual AND significantly alters peoples' rights in areas such as the courts and employment.

Don't unthinkingly refer to the DSM in the assumption that it is a valid, scientific resource...read this book and have your assumptions about mental disorders challenged.

A must for would-be psychologists et al
This was on my wish list and some kind soul bought it for me. This was a book I couldn't put down. Some of the articles are disturbing as some things we take for granted about mental illness appear to have been made up by social and environmental stigma. SPOOKY!!!!