Mental Health Information

Last edited Mon Apr 18, 2016, 07:03 PM - Edit history (1)

It's saying that MOST of the emergence of the dysfunction that was studied to produce the report was a direct sequel to environmental factors.

Yes, of course valium and more recent anti-depressants can relieve depression (even if they don't -cure- it or alter other factors that increase the propensity to become depressed). Yes there are indeed drugs that help with bipolar disorder... yes there are drugs that help patients deal with mental disorder.

That's not the point. The point , according to the research that was done, was that -MOST- which is to say at least half of mental illness plus a fraction is a consequence of environmental factors.

That's a very different view of what's happening and what needs attention. If we only saw mental illness as a chemical imbalance, we most assuredly should look for corrections that involve chemistry. If we saw mental illness as only or even mostly a matter of unfortunate genetic inheritance, then of course the way we address the problem should involve genetics.

What was found is that -most- of mental illness follows directly from environmental factors. In a honest world I would think that would mean attention would be given to environmental factors, perhaps 1) helping people with mental disorders learn to cope with environmental factors and 2) modifying the environment and the part of environment we call "society" to make it less likely to trigger initiation or recurrence of mental illness.

But in the US, there is very little serious thought given to environmental factors in modern research, our focus is on 'the biology of the brain. Current 'fashion' associated with 'cutting edge research' is about molecular level phenomena -inside- the brain (which we must remember is connected to sensory organs that constantly input information to the brain about conditions -outside- the person. It's sort of ridiculous to think that the environment can and should be ignored, and I think if pressed researchers, even researchers in molecular neuroscience wouldn't argue that should be done. But money is tight, money is directed by policy. In the US, the Obama admin has directed that money should be going to 'brain biology', political bias -is- in a quite real way impacting how money is being spent on psychiatric research. The solutions that produces are going to be about molecular phenomena and very likely targets of pharmaceutical bullets, even if as suggested by this article 'most' mental disorders have environmental triggers.

As a person with advanced biological training I sort of doubt many mental illnesses should be considered to be caused by any one family of factors. Biological things just don't usually work that way. The sources of variability that contribute to mental disorders are the -sum- of all the variability not just the source of variability that is the focus of where money is currently being spent.

I;m aware that this sort of discussion challenges people because it challenges status quo understanding of other people's circumstance. And other people have varied experience including many circumstances where 'chemical imbalance' thinking works just fine for them. Getting up above the individual experience and thinking in more global terms is to consider what our biases allow us to see as being ignored.

Separating ourselves from our personal experience enough to appreciate what considering what is being ignored may mean -generally- to mental health could be really important.

On edit:

This issue was a source of discussion in the US two years ago as the neuroscientists wrestled control of research money away from people interested in researching effectiveness of therapy. Now in the UK comes a study that suggests the choice the US system made is likely to be ignoring effectors that most commonly result in mental dysfunction