Mental health and social class

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1959
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 184 KB
• Volume: 15
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0021-9762
• DOI: 10.1002/1097-4679(195901)15:1<116::aid-jclp2270150131>3.0.co;2-x

✦ Synopsis

Hollingshead and Redlich' recently have reported data interesting to all clinical psychologists in a book summarizing the results of a 10 year socio-psychiatric study from Yale University of the interrelations between social class and mental illness. It is evident that broad generalizations from New Haven data to the whole population will depend upon the representativeness of this local situation as an unbiassed sample. Roughly the first half of the book deals with the scope and methods of the study, the local social setting in New Haven, and the relation of social status and psychiatric illness. The data seem to indicate that upper class (classes I and 11) persons get to see a psychiatrist in more "gentle" and insightful ways, while lower class persons are referred in more direct, authoritative and even brutal ways. Strong evidence is presented that there is a definite association between class position and being a psychiatric patient, with the lower classes contributing a much larger proportion of patients to the population. The greatest difference occurred between classes IV and V with the lowest class contributing much higher incidences. Interesting class differences in the incidence of neurotic reactions are shown with character neuroses, obsessive-compulsive reactions, depressive reactions and psychosomatic react,ions being more common in upper class persons, and phobic-anxiety reactions