An entire special issue of the journal Children & Society is dedicated to examining questions surrounding “psychiatrised children.” Various studies explore how rarely children’s lived experiences are included as part of the research literature on psychiatry, how institutionalization disrupts the “independent exploration and identity development” that are crucial to maturation, and how the concepts of being a child “at-risk” for terrorism or mental illness are becoming one and the same in the UK.
In their editorial, Memorial University social work professor Brenda LeFrancois and Edge Hill University sociologist Vicki Coppock describe biomedical psychiatry’s “use of drugs, restraint, solitary confinement and electroshock” on children as “legalised clinical violence.”
Special Issue: Psychiatrised Children and their Rights: Global Perspectives (Children & Society, May 2014, Volume 28, Issue 3)
Freely available on the web from this issue:
Psychiatrised Children and their Rights: Starting the Conversation (Brenda A. LeFrançois and Vicki Coppock, Editorial)
Psychotropic Childhoods: Global MentalHealth and Pharmaceutical Children (China Mills)
The Utmost Discretion: How Presumed Prudence Leaves Children Susceptible to Electroshock (Cheryl van Daalen-Smith et al)