Globalization

Study finds that traditional healers in South Africa, whose services are widely used by the country’s population, perform important suicide prevention work.

Without clarity and consensus around what social justice means, psychologists risk perpetuating injustices that undermine their stated mission.

Barbara Ehrenreich weighs in on mass-market mindfulness, Silicon Valley, Buddhism- sliced up and commodified.

A recent study published in Schizophrenia Research examines the incidence individuals deemed “Ultra High-Risk” (UHR) for psychosis and their neighborhood of residence

A new study explores how “psychosis” and “schizophrenia” are viewed within the Māori community in New Zealand.

Researchers explore neoliberal influences on interactions in psychotherapy and question whether the radical potential of psychotherapy can counter prevailing social systems.

As the Global Mental Health Movement attempts to address cross-cultural mental health disparities, a new article encourages integrating traditional healing practices with psychotherapy.

Trauma-informed approaches have the potential to promote recovery but must involve survivors and service-users to prevent the experience of retraumatization within psychiatric and mental health services.

14-year study of a rural sample in China shows those who were married had higher rates of remission from schizophrenia.

Dr. Gail Hornstein, author of Agnes’s Jacket: A Psychologist’s Search for the Meanings of Madness, discusses the importance of personal narratives and service-user activism in the context of the global mental health movement.

Leading human subjects ethics researcher questions exploitation of uninsured minorities in experimental drug trials.

MIA’s Micah Ingle interviews Mary Watkins about reorienting psychology toward liberation and social justice.

Derek Summerfield, consultant psychiatrist at South London and Maudsley National Health Service Foundation Trust, challenges the assumption that Western depression is a universal condition.

CBT forwards a hyper-rational perspective of human suffering that complements a managerialist culture of efficiency and institutionalization in the Western world.

In a new report, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to health, Dr. Dainius Pūras, calls for a move away from the biomedical model and “excessive use of psychotropic medicines.”

Depression, serious psychological distress, and suicide attempts have risen substantially since the early 2000s among young adults – what’s changed?

Scholars contend that stigma functions as a mechanism of power in analysis of UK Heads Together mental health campaign.

Structural competency in psychiatry emphasizes the social factors shaping patient presentations and encourages physician advocacy.

In many respects it is difficult to fault the report Understanding Psychosis and Schizophrenia, recently published by the British Psychological Society (BPS) and the Division of Clinical Psychology (DCP)[i]; indeed, as recent posts on Mad in America have observed, there is much to admire in it. Whilst not overtly attacking biomedical interpretations of psychosis, it rightly draws attention to the limitations and problems of this model, and points instead to the importance of contexts of adversity, oppression and abuse in understanding psychosis. But the report makes only scant, fleeting references to the role of cultural differences and the complex relationships that are apparent between such differences and individual experiences of psychosis.

New research shows that having a strong sense of personal meaning and purpose can reduce the negative effects of social media use.

Individualist psychological models of poverty pathologize poor communities, decolonial approaches that emphasize context and interdependence may be more sustainable.

An anthropological look at the Global Mental Health (GMH) movement suggests several ethical problems and contradictions in its mission.

New study examines how increased screen time and social media may be contributing to depressive symptoms and suicide risk in teens

Psychology can only deal with racial health disparities effectively by incorporating critical race theory and intervening at a structural level.

Are White Americans’ poor mental health outcomes caused by Whiteness?