Psychscape
Welcome to Psychscape. Random thoughts, ideas and comments about issues related to Psychiatry, Mental Health and Neuroscience.

 





Subscribe to "Psychscape" in Radio UserLand.

Click to see the XML version of this web page.

Click here to send an email to the editor of this weblog.

 

 

  Wednesday, March 10, 2004

Reel Psychiatry

The topic of psychiatry and the cinema has been popular since the 1930's. Examining psychopathology in the movies has provided a rich, entertaining and provocative medium for teaching medical students, residents and physicians. It has also been used to help patients understand complex behaviors and gain insights into their own personality development. A book review in the latest JAMA highlights a new book  by David J. Robinson, MD from the University of Western Ontario entitled "Reel Psychiatry: Movie Portrayals of Psychiatric Conditions" by Rapid Psychler Press.

According to the review, there are a number of books about psychiatry and the movies and these have typically presented a list of films for a variety of life problems or emotional conditions and detail ways of introducing them into the therapy process. These were geared toward having patients view assigned movies at home and discuss them in individual therapy sessions or view and discuss films in group settings. Robinson's book takes a different approach. It is intended for teaching psychiatry rather than for treating patients and provides a summary of DSM-IV-TR diagnostic classification and offers illustrative movies for each category. There is an interesting section in the book that discusses a brief history and characteristics of various conditions along with a listing of the diagnostic criteria and accompanying movie descriptions.

The reviewer (Irving Schneider, MD from Georgetown University Medical School) concludes that Reel Psychiatry is an entertaining and educational book that could easily be recommended to any health professional interested in psychiatric diagnostics, movies, or both.

Additional reading on psychiatry and cinema

Cinebrain - A weblog devoted to psychiatry and the cinema

Reviews of films with mental health and substance abuse themes

The Portrayal of Psychiatry in Recent Film (pdf article)

I Schneider
Images of the mind: psychiatry in the commercial film

Psychiatry & Film: A Fatal Attraction

Psychiatry in the Cinema

Movies and Mental Illness Bibliography

Psychiatry and Cinema Amazon Listing

List of films that demonstrate psychopathology

List of articles and books about psychiatry and the cimema

 


10:37:01 PM    comment []


Click here to visit the Radio UserLand website. © Copyright 2004 rsk.
Last update: 4/5/04; 8:18:26 PM.

March 2004
Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
  1 2 3 4 5 6
7 8 9 10 11 12 13
14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27
28 29 30 31      
Feb   Apr

Links of Interest