Tag Archives: mental disorders

Psychiatry’s latest mental disorders—”Creativity? There’s a pill for that. Not to mention nonconformity and quirkiness”

Since 1950, man has landed on the moon, made computers commonplace and harnessed nuclear power. We’re obviously using our minds to the fullest. Yet the number of ways we can go officially crazy has nearly tripled. The hugely influential reference book used by psychiatrists and other mental health professionals the world over to diagnose mental illness — the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders — currently lists 357 types of psychiatric afflictions, up from 128 when the first volume was published in 1952.

Does psychiatry make us mad? Anatomy of an Epidemic

PSYCHIATRY is widely considered to be a success, able to treat mental illness using drugs to correct chemical imbalances in the brain. Yet, since the advent of psychiatric drugs, rates of mental illness have shot up and the supposed imbalances, thought to be the cause of mental illness, have been shown not to exist.