Behaviorism and Mental Health

Alternative perspective on psychiatry's so-called mental disorders | PHILIP HICKEY, PH.D.

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You are here: Home / Archives for anxiety

Gender Wage Gap and Depression/Anxiety

February 12, 2016 By Phil Hickey | 7 Comments

In their January 2016 issue, the journal Social Science and Medicine published Unequal depression for equal work? How the wage gap explains gendered disparities in mood disorders, by Jonathan Platt, MPH, Seth Prins, PhD candidate, Lisa Bates, PhD, and Katherine Keyes, PhD, MPH.  All the authors work at Columbia’s Department of Public Health. Here’s the… Continue Reading

Benzodiazepines: Disempowering and Dangerous

March 27, 2014 By Phil Hickey | 10 Comments

I recently read an article by Fredric Neuman, MD, Director of the Anxiety and Phobia Center at White Plains Hospital, NY.  The article is titled The Use of the Minor Tranquilizers: Xanax, Ativan, Klonopin, and Valium, and was published in June 2012 by Psychology Today.  Thanks to Medicalskeptic for the link. Dr. Neuman opens by… Continue Reading

Benzodiazepines – Adverse Effects

November 28, 2013 By Phil Hickey | 4 Comments

On November 25, Mad in America posted a link to an article in the Journal of Neurological Sciences.  The article is by Harnod et al, and is titled An Association between Benzodiazepine Use and Occurrence of Benign Brain Tumors.  The authors studied the records of  62,186 individuals in Taiwan  who had been prescribed a benzodiazepine… Continue Reading

Withdrawal from Benzodiazepines

March 17, 2013 By Phil Hickey | 12 Comments

Important updates on this subject can be found at the posts listed at the bottom of the post. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I’ve recently come across an article by Matt Samet called Social Vacuum.  It’s dated March 2013, and was published on Robert… Continue Reading

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Is Not An Illness

April 2, 2012 By Phil Hickey | 41 Comments

Recently I was listening to NPR on the car radio.  The program was about so-called obsessive compulsive disorder, and a woman was describing her difficulty in this area.  I didn’t record her actual words, but it went something like this: I have all these checks and rituals that I have to do each day.  And… Continue Reading

Business As Usual

February 12, 2011 By Phil Hickey | Leave a Comment

Christopher Lane, author of Shyness has written an interesting post.  The gist of the matter is as follows. There’s a class of drugs known as benzodiazepines (benzos for short) that are promoted by Pharma and prescribed by psychiatrists to “treat” anxiety.  (As if anxiety were an illness!)  See my post on the So-called Anxiety Disorders. Benzos… Continue Reading

DSM and Disability

December 12, 2010 By Phil Hickey | Leave a Comment

Every society in every generation makes errors.  Some of the errors are minor.  Some are major.  One of the great errors of the 20th century was this:  we accepted the spurious notion that a wide range of life’s problems were in fact illnesses.  This spurious notion was initiated with good intentions – to provide shelter… Continue Reading

Anxiety Disorders

May 7, 2009 By Phil Hickey | 16 Comments

Fear is the normal human response to imminent danger. It is an adaptive response, in that it is helpful to survival, and it occurs in almost all animal species. When our cave-dwelling ancestors were attacked by mountain lions, they probably experienced acute fear. This fear gave them an extra burst of energy to flee the… Continue Reading

 

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The phrase "mental health" as used in the name of this website is simply a term of convenience. It specifically does not imply that the human problems embraced by this term are illnesses, or that their absence constitutes health. Indeed, the fundamental tenet of this site is that there are no mental illnesses, and that conceptualizing human problems in this way is spurious, destructive, disempowering, and stigmatizing.

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The purpose of this website is to provide a forum where current practices and ideas in the mental health field can be critically examined and discussed. It is not possible in this kind of context to provide psychological help or advice to individuals who may read this site, and nothing written here should be construed in this manner. Readers seeking psychological help should consult a qualified practitioner in their own local area. They should explain their concerns to this person and develop a trusting working relationship. It is only in a one-to-one relationship of this kind that specific advice should be given or taken.

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