Different views decide different therapies 简单探讨中西方对待精神疾病的看法

01 Different views decide different therapies It is reported that mental health problems in China are very serious and mental illnesses head the list of the total burden of disease In China mental illness accounts for about 20 of the total burden of disease and there are 16 million people with serious mental disorders In America mental illness is also a common disease According to the survey every five people in America will have one person with a mental illness and there are 11 4 million adults in the United States suffering from severe mental illnesses From this information we know that mental illnesses really should cause alarm and attention Obviously if we want to cure of these mentally ill people we need to know the nature of their mental illnesses then find some symptomatic treatments So the different views about the nature of mental illnesses between China and America will lead to their different therapies In America the definition of mental illness is based on the syndrome of abnormality which contains Four Ds deviance distress dysfunction and danger To be precise deviance means they have unusual and strange behaviors distress means they have personal suffering dysfunction means they cannot work and lead a normal life danger means they have the risk of harm to self or others These Four Ds give us a general explanation of abnormality and a general method to define the performance of mental illness Through the early American history of psychopathology we find Americans believe that there are three causes leading to abnormal behaviors supernatural causes physical causes and psychological causes With the different cognitive levels about the source of abnormality different symptomatic treatments gradually appear For supernatural causes mental health problems are considered forms of demonic possession until the 18th century In order to dislodge devil from their head people create exorcism ostracism even cruel trephination in 02 that time For physical causes people think some abnormalities in mental are due to physical discomfort and dysfunction such as the wandering womb and imbalance in humors In response they choose to pray for health and rely on hypnosis to improve something abnormal These methods are impractical and cannot really solve the problem For psychological causes people use hypnosis to achieve emotional release They think that mental illnesses are all in the mind and believe the change of mind will lead to the change of body then mental illness can be produced by the psychosomatic link These three treatments are not effective and ethical they show us people in that time were not clear enough on the real causes of mental illness until the 1950s After that people understand mental disease deeper and more accurately than before They find different neurotransmitters and the interaction between neurons play an important role in causing mental problems so some kinds of psychotropic medications were discovered to cure psychopath better Today their opinions about mental illness are detailed and their therapies are targeted Let us choose a concrete example eating disorders In western country include America people regard beauty standards as thinness with health and beauty They are afraid of being overweight and not perfect looking then the eating disorders begin to emerge which can be divided into two categories anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa The former is an eating disorder characterized by refusal to maintain body weight that is within the minimal range of normal More specifically it can be shown by restricting and binge eating purging type which means that people limit the intake of food or offset the calories of food by some extreme methods are not good for their health The latter is another type of eating disorders which belong to binge purge pattern Although their goal is chasing for skinny body too 03 they always eat too much before and then choose unnatural and unhealthy ways to get them out Both of them mainly happen in female and hurt not only their bodies but also their minds In fact the biggest problem is that people with eating disorders have the same extreme and unrealistic goals Perhaps there are other factors like social pressure and family environment affecting personal minds but they cannot become an excuse for a person who is blindly and doggedly seeking an abnormal state Therefore the nature of eating disorders is false cognition and the best symptomatic treatment is cognition therapy Helping peopel form correct ideas about the beauty standards and good eating habits is the most direct and available way to cure them In China the definition of mental illness seems to be more comprehensive than America We do not classify the concrete details specifically instead we use a generalized concept mental illness is a phenomenon that people show their brain dysfunction cause disorders in different degree of cognition emotion will behavior and mental activity under the influences of all kinds of biology psychology and social environmental factors We give an explanation of mental activity to help you understand well Mental activities contain cognitive activity consist of Feeling perception attention memory and thinking emotional activity and volitional activity The process of these activities keep close connection and coordination between each of them to maintain the unity and integrality When it comes to the nature of mental illness we mention that there are two major aspects as pathogenic factors One is individual biology the other one is individual psychology outside environment social factors For this two categories we have specific and detailed classification Biological factors can be divided into four parts genetic factors physique and 04 personality factors character and age of onset and somatic factors They respectively represent the inheritance of disease from family members the whole body s functional status physical state and psychological characteristics different gender and age cause the difference of physical development physiological function and psychological activity infection physical disease toxication and craniocerebral trauma of soma All these four parts are related with the happening of mental illness As for psychological and social environmental factors we also have further classification Life events and natural disasters belong to the former as well as environmental factors and cultural contexts belong to the latter For treatments here are general ideas of therapies that advocated in China first try to get rid of pathogenic environment eliminate related factors and strengthen the spiritual healing second maintain the psychological balance enhance confidence and courage to surmount all difficulties helpful in the prevention of all kinds of mental illness In sum we pay more attention to psychological effects so we mainly use drug therapy and psychotherapy Likewise we take eating disorders as a specific example In China we define eating disorders by three kinds anorexia bulimia and dietary bias Anorexia nervosa is the most popular disease of them so we always talk more about it There are many factors found in China causing anorexia nervosa like sociocultural factors cultural customs that regard beauty standards as thinness depression due to the change of social environment disturbance of psychodynamic and physiological factors and neuroendocrine central dysfunction caused by dysfunction of hypothalamus More alarming is the person who has anorexia nervosa accompanied with binge and purge type also has serious personality disorders They may contain hysteria bigotry schizophrenia and so on These people are 05 likely to be in an instable state and with more aggressivity and impulsivity Besides Chinese common character shyness also aggravate this mental illness People who have issue like this often prefer to hide and keep them as a secret than share the problem with others So most of them cannot get correct solutions The key point is that they need to confront problem then face it by a positive attitude Thus in China to cure of eating disorders we give priority to psychotherapy and use antidepressant antianxiety drugs as complements In conclusion through the comparison of different views about the nature of mental illnesses between China and America we find that they have similar and different corresponding therapies to cure of mental illness caused by specific factors We have to admit that the systematic knowledge of mental illness in China needs to be improved and perfect because we lack of introductio