What a psychiatric diagnosis means – and what it doesn’t mean
With stigma and misunderstanding surrounding mental health, it’s vital to know the benefits and limits of a formal diagnosis
by Awais Aftab
History of psychology and psychiatry
Menopause was a French invention at a time of revolution
French doctors of the 1800s had a vested interest in pathologising women’s ageing, as do many commercial entities today
by Alison M Downham Moore
Why I’ll never forget the day I met Daniel Kahneman for lunch
He was an octogenarian Nobel-winning psychologist, I was a nervous 20-something film producer. Here’s what struck me most
by Namir Khaliq
In psychoanalysis, nostalgia was a sickness. It needn’t be
Nostalgia was, in Freud’s day, an illness steeped in the past. Today, it can be a joyful emotion that reframes the future
by Agnes Arnold-Forster
Why was a laughing woman seen as lethal, not least to herself?
When early cinema weaponised the sight of women’s laughter, it borrowed from flawed psychiatric ideas about female hysteria
by Maggie Hennefeld
Should you confront your worries or try to banish them?
Psychotherapists have long believed it’s a bad idea to suppress worrisome thoughts, but new research is prompting a rethink
by Shayla Love
There’s a growing case for renaming ‘personality disorders’
The concept of personality disorders has been around for centuries but it’s flawed and needs both a rethink and a new name
by Matt Huston
Mental health is not an individual matter, but a political one
Decades ago, pioneering research linked mental illness and economic deprivation. It’s time to take the implications seriously
by Matthew Smith
Worried you’re not normal? Don’t be – there’s no such thing
The history of ‘normal’ tells a tale of prejudice and bad maths. The most usual thing about people is how much we differ
by Sarah Chaney
How a Viennese genius (not the one you think) understood penis envy
Karen Horney’s challenge to Freudian psychosexual theory helped me say ‘penis’ without flinching in my Cairo classroom
by Heba Yosry
Brainwashing has a grim history that we shouldn’t dismiss
Scientific research and historical accounts can help us identify and dissect the threat of ‘coercive persuasion’
by Joel E Dimsdale
Frantz Fanon and the crisis of mental health in the Arab world
Where is Frantz Fanon’s postcolonial ‘new man’ to be found in the persistence of psychiatric institutions in the Arab world?
by Joelle M Abi-Rached
What Arthur Schopenhauer learned about genius at the asylum
‘Might not madness be a mere derangement of memory?’ What Arthur Schopenhauer learnt when he went into the asylum
by David Bather Woods