Portrayals of Mental Illness and Cultural Effects

Historically, researchers and scholars have done studies and issued concerns about the diagnosis of Multiple Personality Disorder-related diseases as well as their connection with social and cultural status. Debbie Nathan, though not the first one, succeeded in presenting the highly professional and complicated subject to ordinary readers and highlighted the role played by cultural backgrounds in defining mental illness. However, in the third section of Sybil Exposed, where most paragraphs are witnessed focus on the treatment procedure implemented on Sybil, merits and shortcomings seem to exist side by side. The extensive delivery of specialized knowledge and lack of strict logic, as two significant factors, draw equally strong forces on the author’s process of achieving the goal of constructing an enduringly persuasive case around mental illnesses. Throughout chapters featuring Shirley’s treatment and recovery, Nathan’s exquisite depiction and sarcastic tone plays a significant role in popularizing psychiatrical elements and characteristics of behavioral expressions among the general public. Of numerous examples, descriptions of Shirley’s sick and capricious activities undoubtedly remain as the most powerful writing device. In chapter nine, one illustration that Shirley “twisted between Adventism and psychoanalysis; faith and science; barbiturates and Benzedrine; her male self, Mike, and her females”, and that she “entered a maze of multiplicity” to the largest degree showcase the complex and subtle layers in thoughts and behaviors of the particular group of mentally ill people in society (Debbie Nathan Retrieved in 2016). Without any question, Nathan’s full and vivid display of the inner experience, embodied in Shirley’s arrays of actions that indicated difficulties and confusions, has offered high values contributing to the advancement of solutions to psychiatric disorders and examinations for social reasons. While the expertise of Sybil Exposed in providing the audience with precise information and comprehensive details deserve praise, the author’s logic is less rigorous compared with other professional studies, despite the introduction of large amounts of records and tapes in the work. The commonly arranged and vague terms, such as “probably” and “very likely” which emerge in many places of the text, are condemned as one major aspect causing her to lose credibility in from of the audience. The widely seen uncertainty, along with sometimes irrelevant mentions of trivial matters, such as Shirley’s dressing details, collectively damage the author’s image of being objective and focused in reaching her aim of enlarging the case’s effects on minds of readers.

Although Debbie Nathan’s indication that Multiple Personality Disorder falls into the category of a cultural conduct is criticized by some as biased, her perspective is mirrored in the content of many other discourses engaging in similar topics on the relation between mental illness and social and cultural practice. According to one report conducted by one agency devoting to psychiatric treatment services, social anticipations and norms affect expressions of individuals, making culture “highly influential on mental health” (Pasadena Villa White Papers 15 April 2015). By first pointing out the unique distinction in examining mental illnesses, which could only be identified by human’s thoughts and behaviors, the text makes a rather effective case through an incorporation of data analysis and thorough investigations of cultural and social meanings in shaping mental health. As it was observed, the diverse nature regarding races, cultural backgrounds, and ethnicities in the United States offers broad opportunities for the generation of massive amounts of ideas, perceptions, making a contributions to the innovation of the whole nation’s psyche. Mental diseases like depression and panic disorders, though happen at a global level, underscore striking differences in various ethnic and cultural spheres. To support the argument powerfully pronounced, examples of stigmas were listed: perception of persons with mental illness as more dangerous, reluctance to marry or hire, demands for separations, the resistance of receiving treatment due to fears for unfairness, and unwillingness to share individual information. Further, another proof aimed at strengthening the article’s credibility came from one study borrowed from the National Institute of Mental Health. It suggested that, of 43.7 million adults in the U.S., females were more likely to catch mental diseases. Besides, it was believed that stigma of mental health was “particularly true within the Asian and African American communities” (Pasadena Villa White Papers 15 April 2015).

Another investigation puts the analytical focus on China and its mainstream media and social network platform. Conducted by scholars from Florida International University, the study primarily announces that stereotypical information about depression-related people given by influential sources often facilitates “stigmatization of or reduced supports for the depressed population (Weirui Wang, Yu Liu 2015).” To make themselves sound clearer, two authors open the text by quoting the claim from European Psychiatry researchers, who saw stigmatization of mental illness as a social construction that decreases values of mentally sick people and hinders pursuits of medical treatment. The report gives affirmation on the Internet’s positive function on gaining supports from the community of the mentally ill as well as encouraging more disclosures of depressive circumstances. Through a variety of statistical results and convincing reasoning, it established itself a solid position by emphasizing that chances given by the Internet of altering the public attitude towards mental disease holders are small in China. An extensive analysis of stereotypes generated about individuals with mental illness indicated that the public’s adoption of negative or inaccurate generalizations could quickly occur and “stigmatize people who are depressed” because of enormous influences of the mainstream media and leaders (Weirui Wang, Yu Liu 2015).

It is not a coincidence that three different works, regardless of their distinctive argumentative focuses and writing styles, have jointly given insightful interpretations on the way various cultural settings on lives of the mentally ill. Whether it is the unearth of Shirley’s childhood trauma created by her mother, racial and cultural diversities’ tremendous controls in the United States or Chinese people’s denial of depressive symptoms as diseases, impacts of components in culture and perspectives and value systems from other people are emphasized. One common point is underlined that stigma in mental illness, quietly possessed and given expressions by many individuals of various social groups, is reinforced by dominant values and confronts unprecedented difficulties in reductions and complete removals.