I was listening to a program on the BBC radio a few years ago, where the presenter was talking of an experiment conducted in 1969. 5 psychiatrists checked themselves into 5 different Psychiatric hospitals in the US under false names and they each wrote just one symptom - they were hearing voices.
As soon as they were admitted they behaved perfectly normally for the rest of their stay. The doctors had "diagnosed" schizophrenia. Over the next 3 weeks or so, each "patient" took notes of what happened around them. The hospital staff put this behaviour down to a manifestations of their mental illness. Infact all these pseudo patients did was construed as evidence of their madness. The doctors could not recognise that these patients were normal having no mental illness. Then again: what is "normal" really?
Think about a man walking into a room with a gun - we all take cover and panic ensues. But put that same man with a gun in the same room with some lights and a camera and straight away we assume he is an actor - no panic. His environment changes our perception. I suppose it was their location that made these sane patients still seem mad.
The really funny part for me was that, on observing these "patients" taking notes and looking around, it was the OTHER PATIENTS that told them that they were sane!! They would say, "You are not a real patient, are you? You are just here to observe, right?" I guess the moral is when an inmate in a mental hospital says you are crazy - you probably are!
I suppose another issue that is raised by this funny story is how we allow the "environment" of our pre-conceptions to colour our judgement or shape our opinions even when there is clear evidence to the contrary. if there's anything we tend to do well is jump to conclusions.
As soon as they were admitted they behaved perfectly normally for the rest of their stay. The doctors had "diagnosed" schizophrenia. Over the next 3 weeks or so, each "patient" took notes of what happened around them. The hospital staff put this behaviour down to a manifestations of their mental illness. Infact all these pseudo patients did was construed as evidence of their madness. The doctors could not recognise that these patients were normal having no mental illness. Then again: what is "normal" really?
Think about a man walking into a room with a gun - we all take cover and panic ensues. But put that same man with a gun in the same room with some lights and a camera and straight away we assume he is an actor - no panic. His environment changes our perception. I suppose it was their location that made these sane patients still seem mad.
The really funny part for me was that, on observing these "patients" taking notes and looking around, it was the OTHER PATIENTS that told them that they were sane!! They would say, "You are not a real patient, are you? You are just here to observe, right?" I guess the moral is when an inmate in a mental hospital says you are crazy - you probably are!
I suppose another issue that is raised by this funny story is how we allow the "environment" of our pre-conceptions to colour our judgement or shape our opinions even when there is clear evidence to the contrary. if there's anything we tend to do well is jump to conclusions.
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