Nine Dimensions of Madness

Name: Nine Dimensions of Madness
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ISBN: 9781583949269

Redefining Mental Health

Robert L. Gallon, Society for the Study of Native Arts and Sciences

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English

North Atlantic Books,U.S.
01 December 2015

Abnormal psychology; Psychiatry

In a book that reframes the mental health debate, Robert L. Gallon challenges the widely-held notion that mental disorders are medical diseases. Drawing on his extensive experience as a psychologist who has worked with thousands of patients, he argues that there are no objective indicators of mental disorders and therefore no way of drawing a distinct line between people who have them and people who don't. He outlines an alternative to the disease model defined by nine dimensions of dysfunction that encompass the range of human dysfunctions typically classified as mental disorders. He explains the origin of these problems, not as chemical imbalances and genetic abnormalities, but as the complex interaction of biological, psychological and social factors, called the Biopsychosocial model.

Gallon explains the history of psychiatry and how it came to develop a medical model that codifies mental disorders in the psychiatric bible, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), now in its fifth edition. He demonstrates how, in 1950s and1960s when the miracle psychiatric drugs came on the market, it was to the great economic advantage of both pharmaceutical companies and psychiatrists to describe people's problems in the language of medicine. His alternative to this disease model suggests descriptive types--Reality Misperception, Mood Dysfunction, Anxiety, Cognitive Competence, Social Competence, Somatoform Dysfunction, Substance Dependence, Motivation and Impulse Control, and Socialization Dysfunction--that we can construct to discuss the kinds and severities of problems people experience. These are not discrete abnormalities, but are sorts of dysfunction that can be placed on dimensions of dysfunction.

Table of Contents

Part I History of Madness

1. Introduction and Some Definitions

2. How madness became Medical 3. The Rise of Psychiatric Diagnosis 4. An Alternative Model

Part II Dimensions of Madness 5. Reality Misperception

6. Mood Dysfunction

7. Anxiety

8. Cognitive Competence

9. Social Competence

10. Somatoform Dysfunction

11. Substance Dependence

12. Motivation and Impulse Control 13. Socialization Dysfunction

Part III Treatment and Other Issues 14. What is Mental Health Treatment?

15. The Future

By: Robert L. Gallon, Society for the Study of Native Arts and Sciences
Imprint: North Atlantic Books,U.S.
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 228mm, Width: 152mm, Spine: 35mm
Weight: 658g
ISBN: 9781583949269
ISBN 10: 1583949267
Pages: 496
Publication Date: 01 December 2015
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Robert L. Gallon, PhD, has taught in the Department of Psychiatry and was a psychologist at the Psychosomatic Medicine Clinic at the Jefferson Medical School. As Chief Psychologist at Eastern Maine Medical Center he worked with the Rehabilitation Medicine Department to found a Chronic Pain Program. He was a Psychological Examiner for the court for involuntarily committed psychiatric patients and a consulting psychologist for the State Forensic Service. Over the course of his career, has evaluated more than 5000 individuals in a wide variety of circumstances.

Reviews for Nine Dimensions of Madness: Redefining Mental Health

Readers of this eye-opening book will find their beliefs and assumptions about 'mental disorders' forever changed. Dr. Gallon has an axe to grind and he grinds it to a razor-sharp edge. He is scathing in his indictment of the medical model that prevails in psychiatry, which he sees as not only fundamentally flawed, but self-serving. Combining scholarly research with his personal experiences as a clinical psychologist, with fascinating examples and anecdotes, the book is an eminently readable exploration of 'madness' in our time. -Howard Ehrlichman, PhD, Emeritus Professor of Psychology, Queens College of the City University of New York and coauthor of Personality Psychology: The Science of Individuality An interesting and important book. The subject, mental disease and disorder, is worthy of careful attention. Gallon beautifully illustrates the differences between taxonomy and typology. The changes in treatment, the consequences to society of those changes, and the advocates of those changes are well laid out. He does not shrink from the responsibility of defining where he stands or what direction we should take. -Julius R. Krevans, MD, Emeritus Dean of the Medical School and Emeritus Chancellor, University of California, San Francisco