Adult

Pending research on the connection between insomnia and depression offers new prospects for treatment, according to recent articles in the New York Times.  "Psychiatrists...

A 48-year longitudinal study of 244 subjects, published in Schizophrenia Research, finds that those with schizophrenia-spectrum diagnoses had had the worst social functioning scores at...

E. Fuller Torrey has a new book. While I was not thrilled to support the Treatment Advocacy Center, I was curious as to what he had to say. Where Torrey has clarity, I contend there is much that we still do not understand. I worry that a perspective that suggests the answers are clear cuts us off from inquiry into alternate approaches.

Researchers (including Jim van Os) find, in a three-year cohort study of 1272 people at possible genetic risk of psychosis, that "most transitions (to psychosis)...

Research on a sample of 587 patients with DSM-IV defined bipolar disorder finds that an earlier age at onset of bipolar illness - along...

The New York Times reports on new research from multiple sources that finds focused attention on insomnia is proving to be a "cheap, relatively...

Britain's The Independent tells the story of Lloyd Dres, a 44-year-old former stock trader, who has been trying to make sense of the "paranoid...

When I lived in Massachusetts I taught yoga and led writing groups for alternative mental health communities. While the organizations I worked for were alternative, many of the students and participants were heavily drugged with psychiatric pharmaceuticals. There was one skinny teenager I'd never have forgotten who listed the drugs he was on for me once in the yoga room after class: a long list of stimulants, neuroleptics, moods stabilizers; far too many drugs and classes of drugs to remember. I was at the housewarming party of an old friend, and who should walk in but that boy who used to come to my yoga classes and writing groups religiously. And he was no longer a boy; he was now a young man. “I'm thinking yoga teacher,” he said. I nodded. Did he remember where? “I'm not stupid,” he said, as if reading my mind. “I'm not on drugs anymore. I'm not stupid anymore.”

Kingsley Hall was the first of Laing’s household communities that served as a place where you could live through madness until you could get it together and live independently. It was conceived as an “asylum” from forms of treatment — psychiatric or otherwise — that many were convinced were not helpful, and even contributed to their difficulties. By the time I arrived in London in 1973 to study with Laing there were four or five such places. Getting in wasn’t easy.

Bob Fiddamen dissects the issue of suicidality, bizarre behavior and antidepressants in light of BMJ Open's publication of "Suicide-related events in young people following...

Phil Hickey of Behaviorism and Mental Health picks apart 60 Minutes' segment interviewing E. Fuller Torrey (Untreated mental illness an imminent danger?), and APA...

This blog was prompted by an invitation to do a guest post on the site of one of my favorite bloggers, 1 Boring Old Man. This is my response to the notion that there are certain conditions - Schizophrenia among them - that correspond more directly to biomedical conditions

Research from the universities of Cardiff, Cambridge and Bristol finds no evidence of a link between genetic associations with schizophrenia and adolescent psychotic experiences....

Research drawing on the British national survey finds that, despite the fact that psychotic conditions and mood disorders have historically been approached as separate...

Research from UCLA finds that rats exposed to early life trauma showed aberrations  of stress hormones, receptors in the amygdala, and inhibited or avoidant...

Being morose provides benefits, according to research suggesting that detail-oriented, analytical thinking styles can accompany periods of sadness.  Science News reports that people experiencing...

Researchers from three U.K. Universities analyzed the responses of 32,827 people to online questionnaires, finding that  social deprivation and traumatic or abusive life-experiences strongly...

Canada's The Star traces the "chemical imbalance" story's fall from bedrock scientific principle to marketing device, at the same time that a $70 billion...

The death of Master Chef contestant Josh Marks, who committed suicide within 24 hours of receiving a schizophrenia diagnosis, inspires PsychCentral writer Patrick Tracey...

Researchers from the University of Toronto departments of Psychiatry and Pharmacology, publishing in Progress in Neuro-Psychopharmacology and Biological Psychiatry, propose that various forms of stress,...

“This case does not make sense in the normal sense,” Assistant Prosecutor Doug Newton told jurors in the trial of Michael Hamilton for murder....

Researchers at Tufts University exposed rats and their children to early life stress, resulting in depressed maternal care, aggression, increased restlessness and anxiety-related...

Sandra Steingard writes in Community Psychiatrist about Lex Wunderink's study, published in the August JAMA Psychiatry, which found that people who discontinued medication have...

Singer Sinead O'Connor announced on her website that after several "second opinions" she has learned "I do not in fact suffer from Bi Polar...