Week 6 - Linnea Patterson A02

Linnea Patterson
7 May 2017
ASA 2 A02

Week 6 

This week's reading "The Americanization of Mental Illness" really stood out to me. I've always heard the belief that America views mental illness in a very different light compared to other countries, but I hadn't been exposed to the ways in which America's hypersensitivity and backwards understanding on the topic affect other countries (according to the text). Ethan Watters argues that cultural beliefs shape an individual's understanding towards their medical ailment and in the West's case, in an extreme way, which leads to dramatizing the event. The West's values of self-control and belief that one's "self" is separate from one's brain is not universal. Watters claims that traditional cultures value a "less isolating view of human nature" (6) which results in low levels of expressed emotion, and consequently more improvement to those suffering with mental illness. 

We in America and the West tend to believe that our way is universally understood as the best, which is simply untrue in the case of mental illness. "Americanization" is actually harmful to humans in this case. By treating the mind as a fragile thing, and separate from one's body, Watters argues that the West is damaging the world's understanding of mental illness. I have to agree with Watters that what America is providing as the solution to mental illness: theories and treatments offered "in an attempt to ameliorate the psychological stress sparked by modernization and globalization" (7), may actually be part of the problem. Although I believe the West has made great leaps in progress in terms of medicine, there is certainly a lack of understanding of the mind itself. Many people in my life have been affected by mental illnesses, and although medicine has helped many of them, I think medicine isn't always the answer; and a deeper and necessary understanding of the healing process of the mind is not understood by most Americans. I think there is definitely something to learn from the ways other cultures deal with mental disorders, because the rise of mental illnesses in America clearly shows that we aren't doing this right. How can we as a culture, step back and assess the benefits of other ways of treating mental illness? Included is the representation of the rise of ADHD in America, just one example of how mental illnesses have risen, perhaps due to the way America chooses to address mental health.

References 

Reporter, D. M. (2011, November 17). One in four American women take medication for a mental disorder. Retrieved May 07, 2017, from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2062634/One-American-women-medication-mental-disorder.html

Watters, E. (2010, January 09). The Americanization of Mental Illness. Retrieved May 07, 2017, from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/10/magazine/10psyche-t.html