In a 1973 paper "On Being Sane in Insane Places", psychologist David Rosenhan strongly criticised psychiatric hospitals and the treatment patients received in them. But most of all, he criticised the quality of the psychiatric diagnosis. Rosenhan's stance was based on research the he and 7 otherinvestigators undertook acting as pseudo-patients in different hospitals around the United States.
All were diagnosed with psychiatric disorders. To be admitted into the hospitals, the pseudo-patients complained about auditory hallucinations. After admission, however, they behaved perfectly normal, telling medical staff in the hospitals that their hallucinations had disappeared.
But the medical staff still regarded the pseudo-patients as mentally ill and fed them antipsychotic medication. The pseudo-patients would flush the medications down the toilet, and continue acting in a calm, rational fashion, writing down their observations of the staff and the other patients. However, they were still treated as having mental problems. Instead of investigating the issue, nobody regarded their behaviour as normal, because apparently inside the walls of a psychiatric hospital, the only sane ones are the employees.
A roll in the hay
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1. "My friend got a degree in Egyptology, but I can't get a job, so he's paying more money to get a PHD, so he can work teaching other people Egyptology. In his case tertiary education is literally a pyramid scheme."
2. "I waved at a man because I thought he waved at me. Apparently he waved to another woman. So to get out of the awkward situation I kept my hand up and a taxi pulled over and drove me to the airport. I am now in Poland starting a new life."
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3." For the past two years the ticket man at my station has baffled me. Some days we get on like a house on fire, chatting about life. Other days he won't even return a hello…turns out to be a pair of identical twins who both work there. Two separate men. For two years."
4. "My friend Luke didn't realise until he was an adult that lukewarm was a real temperature, he thought it was just a term his mum used to describe his bath water."
