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The Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal Conduct (Revised Edition)
 
 
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The Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal Conduct (Revised Edition) (Paperback)

~ Thomas S. Szasz (Author) "Since the modern concept of hysteria was cut from the cloth of malingering, and since the physician most responsible for establishing "hysteria" as a medically..." (more)
Key Phrases: iconic body signs, impersonated role, vegetative neurosis, Middle Ages, United States, Soviet Union (more...)
3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (33 customer reviews)

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The Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal Conduct (Revised Edition) + Psychiatry: The Science of Lies + The Medicalization of Everyday Life: Selected Essays
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"Bold and often brilliant." -- --Science


Product Description

A classic work that has revolutionized thinking throughout the Western world about the nature of the psychiatric profession and the moral implications of its practices. "Bold and often brilliant."--Science

Product Details

  • Paperback: 320 pages
  • Publisher: Harper Perennial; Revised edition (October 10, 1984)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0060911514
  • ISBN-13: 978-0060911515
  • Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (33 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.com Sales Rank: #45,941 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

    #25 in  Books > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Behavioral Sciences > Behavioral Psychology
    #47 in  Books > Science > Behavioral Sciences > Behavioral Psychology

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Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
Since the modern concept of hysteria was cut from the cloth of malingering, and since the physician most responsible for establishing "hysteria" as a medically legitimate illness was Charcot, I shall start with an examination of his work; and I shall then trace the development of the concept of hysteria to the present time. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
iconic body signs, impersonated role, vegetative neurosis, private practice situation, counterfeit illness, nondiscursive languages, organ neurosis, medical game, interpersonal rules, organic symptoms, charity practice, biological rules, conversion hysteria, hysterical conversion, iconic signs, sign user
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Middle Ages, United States, Soviet Union, John Doe
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The Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal Conduct (Revised Edition)
83% buy the item featured on this page:
The Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal Conduct (Revised Edition) 3.1 out of 5 stars (33)
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Psychiatry: The Science of Lies
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Psychiatry: The Science of Lies 5.0 out of 5 stars (3)
$13.57
The Medicalization of Everyday Life: Selected Essays
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The Medicalization of Everyday Life: Selected Essays 5.0 out of 5 stars (3)
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The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement
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The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement 4.8 out of 5 stars (8)
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45 of 56 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars The Myth Revisited, August 4, 2001
By Dennis B. Roderick, Ph.D "droderickphd" (Pawtucket, RI United States) - See all my reviews
Dr. Szasz'definitive work should be revisited by all mental health professionals in this new era of "managed care" and its resultant "new mental health system". Although I don't agree with everything that Dr. Szasz claimed in his groundbreaking book, it seems to me that those who considered him a quack and continued the medical model of mental illness for the last 4+ decades have not proven him wrong. We have miserably failed the "mentally ill", "mentally disordered", people with "problems in living", or whatever term one uses these days. The mental health system and its providers these days use the excuse of managed care to explain its failures, but would be better advised to read or reread Dr. Szasz's forewarning of 40 years ago. It is time to rethink the problem, and a good place to start is with the "Myth of Mental Illness"-before the death of the mental health system is upon us.
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44 of 61 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars One of the Most Important Books in Psychiatry and Philosophy, September 22, 1998
By A Customer
I believe this is one of the most important books in the history of psychiatry. The book is ground-breaking and establishes a new parardigm and organizing concept for many "mind" disciplines. Dr Szasz's ideas are timeless, revolutionary and common sense - not to be contrued as a criticism. Indeed many revolutionary ideas are simple and obvious and I think that is exactly why this book and Dr Szasz must be taken seriously. I am speaking behind the times when I say this because the book is nearly 40 years on the market. However Dr Szasz is as relevant today as ever. Institutionalized persecution of "different" behaviours has evolved beyond the ridiculous to the absurd. Dr Szasz's characterization of this as a "war on personal responsibility" is important from a medical and a moral perspective, as a challenge to the popular notions of "inner child", the gowing "victim" industry (e.g. gambling and shopping "addictions", among many many more) and similiar conceptual garabage.

The Myth of Mental Illness creates for the reader a reference point for cross diciplinary thinking in sociology, linguistics, philosophy of mind and science, psychology, history and or course medicine. The concepts are true to human beings as self-responsible moral agents and consistent with the North American work-ethic. Dr Szasz is commended for his insight and understanding of a pyschiatric industry gone mad. The book should be part of Amazon's "Well Worth Reading" displays.

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21 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A Myth Indeed, April 29, 2004
Descriptive criteria aside, what is the essence of mental disorders? Are they merely physiological disorders of the brain, or, more precisely of its chemistry? If so, can they be cured by restoring the balance of substances and secretions in that mysterious organ? And, once equilibrium is reinstated - is the illness "gone" or is it still lurking there, "under wraps", waiting to erupt? Are psychiatric problems inherited, rooted in faulty genes (though amplified by environmental factors) - or brought on by abusive or wrong nurturance?

These questions are the domain of the "medical" school of mental health.

Others cling to the spiritual view of the human psyche. They believe that mental ailments amount to the metaphysical discomposure of an unknown medium - the soul. Theirs is a holistic approach, taking in the patient in his or her entirety, as well as his milieu.

The members of the functional school regard mental health disorders as perturbations in the proper, statistically "normal", behaviours and manifestations of "healthy" individuals, or as dysfunctions. The "sick" individual - ill at ease with himself (ego-dystonic) or making others unhappy (deviant) - is "mended" when rendered functional again by the prevailing standards of his social and cultural frame of reference.

In a way, the three schools are akin to the trio of blind men who render disparate descriptions of the very same elephant. Still, they share not only their subject matter - but, to a counter intuitively large degree, a faulty methodology.

As the renowned anti-psychiatrist, Thomas Szasz, of the State University of New York, notes in his article "The Lying Truths of Psychiatry", mental health scholars, regardless of academic predilection, infer the etiology of mental disorders from the success or failure of treatment modalities.

This form of "reverse engineering" of scientific models is not unknown in other fields of science, nor is it unacceptable if the experiments meet the criteria of the scientific method. The theory must be all-inclusive (anamnetic), consistent, falsifiable, logically compatible, monovalent, and parsimonious. Psychological "theories" - even the "medical" ones (the role of serotonin and dopamine in mood disorders, for instance) - are usually none of these things.

The outcome is a bewildering array of ever-shifting mental health "diagnoses" expressly centred around Western civilisation and its standards (example: the ethical objection to suicide). Neurosis, a historically fundamental "condition" vanished after 1980. Homosexuality, according to the American Psychiatric Association, was a pathology prior to 1973. Seven years later, narcissism was declared a "personality disorder", almost seven decades after it was first described by Freud.

Szasz is the father of the "anti psychiatry" movement and this is his best book - a riveting, mind boggling,scholarly read. Sam Vaknin, author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited".

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

2.0 out of 5 stars Intersting but incomplete
Szazs' perspective on the etiology of mental illness and problems of living has a great deal of merit. In retrospect, however, it is a quite short-sighted. Read more
Published 5 months ago by not a natural

5.0 out of 5 stars Thomas Szasz; The Myth of Mental Illness Foundations of a theory
Thomas Szasz: The Myth of Mental Illness Foundation of a theory

Thomas Szasz shows how Mental Illness is not a illness, but a judgement and social control... Read more
Published 11 months ago by Anna de Jonge

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent book!
I got the book at the date and condition I was expecting it. I am really satisfied with this order. Thank you!
Published 18 months ago by Kristina Dumas

5.0 out of 5 stars The Myth of Mental illness Review
THE MYTH OF MENTAL ILLNES REVIEW



The Myth of Mental Illness is an interesting work that should be reading by many people before they go to visit a... Read more
Published 22 months ago by Sergio Ivan Linares

5.0 out of 5 stars MENTAL ILLNESS DOES NOT EXIST
This work contains two prefaces, one from the 1961's edition and the preface for the revised edition, 1974. Read more
Published on October 26, 2007 by Sergio Iván Linares

4.0 out of 5 stars judge for yourself
Researched well, provacative, a classic. Worth reading if only to stimulate debate regarding the medicalization of human behavior. Read more
Published on September 25, 2007 by L. Vanbelle

1.0 out of 5 stars Waste of time
I'm a big believer in the abuse of so-called mental illness by both "patients" and their doctors to excuse the most heinous crimes. Read more
Published on July 25, 2007 by Eve R. Bieber

5.0 out of 5 stars Necessary
This book is as needed as ever in our present age of "biological" psychology, where general practitioners who know little to nothing about psychology are quick to prescribe drugs... Read more
Published on January 30, 2007 by The Doctor

1.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating Isn't Always Truth
When I was a psychology major, Szasz's views made for intersting conversation. Having been diagnosed with major depressive disorder, and later having worked as a mental health... Read more
Published on May 13, 2006 by J. Davita-Rauch

1.0 out of 5 stars Outdated Ideology
In the 1960's facing the cruel conditions of institutionalization and coercive psychiatry, writers such as R.D. Read more
Published on February 28, 2006 by directions

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