Stages of change and physical activity among individuals with severe mental illness.

Objective: To apply the constructs of the transtheoretical model (TTM) of change to understand physical activity among individuals with severe mental illness. Method: Predictions of stages of change of physical activity and self-reported physical activity were investigated among 92 adults with severe mental illness, using cognitive and behavioral processes of change, self-efficacy, and perceived pros and cons of exercise as predictors. Results: Separate logistic regression analyses for adjacent pairs of stages indicated that 33% of the variance was accounted for when predicting preparation versus action/maintenance stages, with behavioral processes making a significant unique contribution to prediction. A multiple-regression analysis was conducted to examine prediction of self-reported physical activity on the basis of all of the TTM measures, and the full model accounted for nearly 27% of the variance. Conclusion: Results suggest that TTM constructs hold promise in understanding physical activity of people with severe mental illness with significant implications for clinical practice and future research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Statement on mental illness and mental retardation.

The statement made on behalf of the American Psychological Association is in support of Senate Bills 755 and 756 developed by Congress in response to President Kennedy's message on mental illness and mental retardation. "The psychologist is vitually concerned with the problems of mental disorders and of mental retardation. He is especially interested in research, and in the provision of services to people through the organized agencies of society, such as the public schools, community mental health centers, hospitals, institutions for the retarded, and rehabilitation agencies of many kinds." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Research definitions of mental health and mental illness.

The conceptual and methodological difficulties involved in each of the various categories of definitions of mental health outlined in this review are discussed. Suggestions for further research are presented. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Physical attractiveness and mental illness.

Investigated the relation between physical attractiveness and mental disorder in 2 studies of women. In the 1st study, 23 hospitalized mental patients, 30 university employees, and 29 shoppers served as Ss. Results show that the hospitalized mental patients were decidedly less physically attractive than normal controls, based either on live (face-to-face) ratings or on ratings of photographs of the Ss by judges who were unaware of the Ss' mental statuses. Early and current adjustment were reliably associated with appearance for both mental patients and nonpatients. A 2nd study of 50 mental patients replicated some of the 1st study's findings and further examined the consequences of appearance within a psychiatric hospital setting. As compared to the more attractive patients, homelier patients were less socially responsive in a standardized interview procedure, had more severe diagnoses, were hospitalized for longer periods, and received fewer visitors from the community. Physical attractiveness accounted for a large significant amount of length-of-hospitalization variation when degree of psychopathology and other possible moderator variables were controlled statistically. (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social psychological correlates of mental illness and mental health.

If there is ever to be a single comprehensive theory and/or research program concerned with the etiology of mental illness, the widely diversified empirical and theoretical findings will have to be meaningfully integrated. The present paper critically reviews theories and research from the environmental-demographic level and the interpersonal level. The large number of phenotypical relationships reported have led only to vaguely formulated and speculative interpretations suggesting the need for a reformulation which will suggest genotypes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mental illness and mental retardation: Message from the President of the United States relative to mental illness and mental retardation.

2 health problems of critical size and tragic impact are mental illness and mental retardation. "There are now about 800,000 such patients in this Nation's institutions—600,000 for mental illness and over 200,000 for mental retardation." A 3-fold attack is proposed: (a) Ascertain causes and eradicate them. (b) Strengthen underlying resources of knowledge and of skilled manpower. (c) Strengthen and improve facilities serving the mentally ill and mentally retarded. A national program for mental health is proposed which emphasizes comprehensive community mental health centers, improved care in state mental institutions, and expansion of research activities and increase in professional manpower. A national program to combat mental retardation emphasizing prevention, community services, and research is also proposed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Research on religion and serious mental illness

According to this review, religion plays a largely positive role in mental health; future research on severe mental disorders should include religious factors more directly.     

Social consequences of mental illness.

The person who is publicly known to have had a hospitalization for "mental illness" was inferred to be vulnerable to a sharp depreciation of social esteem in a wide range of social roles. Cross-validation across samples of Ss and across time indicated that the frame of reference of the normal adult population, as to the role status of ex-mental-hospital patients, is both general (widely consensual) and specific (differentiated from other negative social roles that evoke anxiety and fear and carry a social stigma). 2 broad dimensions were postulated to underlie the evaluative complex for ex-mental-hospital patients—an "anxiety-fear" dimension and a "sympathy-contempt" dimension. (32 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The biological basis of mental illness

Belief in the biological roots of mental illness will govern some of what we do in a psychiatric rehabilitation program.     

Redefining the targets for mental illness

This article reviews the initiatives which have been developed in mental health services in an attempt to meet the targets set out in the government's Health of the Nation White Paper (1). The author argues that the targets for mental health were crudely defined and more funding is needed to address primary care problems which are currently badly neglected.     

Models of feigned mental illness.

The pathogenic and Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-III—Revised (DSM-III—R) models are presented for the understanding of malingering. The value of the DSM-III-R approach is questioned because its indices are not supported by research and its focus is unduly moralistic. In its place, an adaptational model is proposed as an application of decision theory in which the malingerer perceives an adversarial context and chooses feigning on the basis of likelihood and expected utility. Studies offering preliminary support for the adaptational model from psychiatric and forensic settings are reviewed. Finally, detection models of malingering are highlighted with the need for convergent validation, combining known-group and simulation designs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The myth of mental illness.

"My aim in this essay is to raise the question 'Is there such a thing as mental illness?' and to argue that there is not." Major sections are: Mental Illness as a Sign of Brain Disease; Mental Illness as a Name for Problems in Living; The Role of Ethics in Psychiatry; Choice, Responsibility, and Psychiatry; and Conclusions. Mental illness "is a myth, whose function it is to disguise and thus render more palatable the bitter pill of moral conflicts in human relations." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The science of infanticide and mental illness.

Women who murder their children have been the subject of intensive media and public scrutiny. Reactions have varied from horror at the cruelty of the act to sympathy for the perpetrator, based on the belief that the mother must have been severely mentally disordered or at least suffering from a diminished mental capacity at the time of the offense. As a result, the English and American legal systems have adopted very different legal responses to this crime. Underlying these legal positions are assumptions about the effect of childbirth on mental status and the relation of mental status to the legal criteria necessary to meet a legal defense (e.g., insanity) or necessary to justify charging the offender with a lesser crime. This article critically considers the scientific knowledge on infanticide and mental illness to determine the appropriateness of these assumptions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dementia: a serious and enduring mental illness

At the 1997 RCN Congress, the RCN Mental Health and Older People Forum put forward a matter for debate--how the definition of 'serious and enduring mental illness' affects services to people with dementia. Subsequently, the RCN agreed both a position paper, which includes dementia in the definition, and an action plan for dissemination and support of the RCN position. Alison Soliman describes the background to the position paper.     

Epidemiological studies of life change and illness

Currently popular methodologies in life changes and illness research are presented in some detail. Selected examples of epidemiological studies utilizing these methodololgies are briefly reviewed. Examples of both retrospective and prospective investigations of life change and illness are given. Discussed in the chapter are the author's views as to limitations of the epidemiologic method and probable directions of future research in efforts to clarify etiologic mechanisms along the pathway between subjects' recent life changes and their subsequent susceptibility to illness.     

Offenders with mental illness: prevalence and responsibility

A wound to the ureter is a possible complication of laparoscopy and is usually repaired by suture requiring laparotomy. We report a case of a laparoscopic stitch and review the pertinent literature.     

Culture conflict in the treatment of "mental illness" and the central role of patient leader.

Describes new treatment programs which emphasized patients' responsibility and problem-solving action and heightened the conflict with patients' expectations that they be held unaccountable for their deviant behavior and excused from taking corrective action. Results from 50 patients showed Ss' attitudes were markedly less favorable toward a new program than toward a more traditional one. Patient leaders played an important role by organizing Ss to produce an active program, thereby encouraging staff tolerance for a nonrestrictive, continuous hospital stay for all interested Ss. Leaders were evaluated more favorably than nonleaders by both Ss and staff, with the exception of behaviors related solely to staff goals. The stalemate, successfully negotiated by the leaders, was broken only after the staff imposed a time limit on hospital stay. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Severe mental illness and HIV-related medical and neuropsychiatric sequelae

Medical and neuropsychiatric sequelae of HIV infection present a spectrum of diagnostic and treatment challenges to mental health clinicians. Both HIV and the many opportunistic infections that manifest in patients due to their immunocompromised state also can affect the central nervous system (CNS). Thus, mental health clinicians need to be familiar with the diagnosis and management of HIV-related medical and psychiatric complications. This article provides an overview of the CNS-related manifestations resulting from HIV disease, including HIV-related dementia, psychotic disorders, delirium, CNS opportunistic infections and tumors, systemic abnormalities, psychoactive substances, and the adverse effects of certain medical treatments. Treatment strategies for individuals with HIV disease and comorbid severe mental illness are outlined and recommendations for future research are offered.