Clinical and Cultural Perspectives on Mental Illness in the U.S. Navy.
Abstract
Ethnopsychiatry is viewed as a process of negotiation between two different perspectives on behavior, the clinical and the cultural. This process is examined in the context of U. S. Navy outpatient mental health clinics. In this context, mental illness must be understood in terms of the influence of the meaning systems of the clinician, patient, and military organization. This paper describes the cultural foundations of mental illness in the Navy and presents an analysis of ethnic differences in self-reported symptoms and precipitating factors, referral sources, DSM-III diagnoses, and clinician recommendations of over 10,000 outpatients who visited one of four Fleet Mental health Support Units in the San Diego area between November 1982 and June 1986. At issue is whether differences in cultural meanings significantly alter the experience and symptoms of mental illness among members of different ethnic groups in the same organizational environment. keywords: Mental health, Outpatient clinics, Organizational culture, Ethnicity, Performance(Human), Navy personnel, military psychology.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 09, 1987
- Accession Number
- ADA190271
Entities
People
- Lawrence A Palinkas
- Louis Balazs
- Patricia Coben
Organizations
- Naval Health Research Center