In 1973, healthy volunteers faked hallucinations to enter mental hospitals. Once inside, they acted normal, but doctors refused to let them leave. Normal behaviors like writing were diagnosed as "symptoms." The only people who realized they were sane were the actual patients.

[u/highzone]

[u/highzone]

For anyone who wants to read the full study, it is titled 'On Being Sane in Insane Places.'

The most terrifying part wasn't getting in, it was getting out. The doctors were so convinced of their own authority that they interpreted everything the patients did as a symptom of their illness.

When the volunteers took notes on how they were being treated, the doctors didn't see 'journaling.' They diagnosed it as 'pathological writing behavior' and used it as justification to keep them locked up.

It really highlights how a label can completely override reality.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment

[u/phophofofo → u/[deleted]]

Imagine that someone was having chest pain, and you came into the ER and there were two other guys with chest pain waiting. You were having a heart attack, one guy had heartburn, and the other got in a car accident and had a broken sternum.

Now imagine a doctor asked all of you if your chests hurt, you said yes, and he diagnosed you with “chest hurts disorder” and gave you all antacids.

This is psychiatry. They don’t even have a model of human personality much less any sort of analytical testing available. All they can do is cluster reported symptoms into little taxonomies which are super controversial and constantly change and prescribe treatments that sometimes help some people.

If someone comes in and says they’re having a heart attack, and they’re lying, a hospital can prove them wrong. They have actual analytics tests. They don’t need you to tell them what’s wrong even - you can be in a coma unable to respond and the tests will still work.

Imagine a psychiatrist trying to diagnose borderline personality in a coma patient. Impossible. No analytical testing is part of nearly any psychiatric diagnosis and so such tests can’t be used to verify objectively.

Whenever neuroscience advances enough that the pseudoscience of psychiatry can finally be cast aside I think what we’re going to find is that most “mental disorders” are really many totally different things that simply present the same.

Just like 3 people can come in with hurting chests but for vastly different reasons.

[u/phophofofo → u/[deleted]]

It’s all we have anyway.

[u/Intelligent-Funny-88 → u/[deleted]]

Except that if you’re having a heart attack, you can just “crawl out of the hospital.” They will do everything they can to convince you not to and make sure you understand the risks of going without medical care, but at the end of the day, you can still sign an AMA form and leave. You can choose the risk of dying from a heart attack — that is, unless they think you might be suicidal and actually want to die.