Psychiatry & Psychotherapy

The history of brainwashing is a red flag for techno-therapy

David Saunders

What lurks beneath

The grand drama of Freud’s ideas has obscured the reality: every school of psychology needs a theory of the unconscious

Antonio Melechi

The divine fire of Philip K Dick’s religious visions

Kyle Arnold

Spiritual emergency

After decades of practising as a psychotherapist, I am convinced that our treatment of psychosis is thoroughly wrong-headed

James Carpenter

Psychiatry is due for a revolution in diagnosis and treatment through brain science

4 minutes

Violence stalks the American Dream like a badass cowboy

Jean Kim

To heal trauma from childhood, relive the neglect and abuse

Pamela Garber

In praise of defiance

Labelling someone crazy and difficult is a way to resist justice and change – and psychiatrists are complicit

Carrie Arnold

China’s first depression support group helps where society and state fail

11 minutes

Cracking the skull open

Most of our organs can be treated as repairable machines. Why can’t we treat mental illness by simply fixing the brain?

Joe Herbert

The company you keep

Hallucinated voices can be helpful life guides, muses of creativity, and powerful agents for healing the fractured self

Shruti Ravindran

Have mental health diagnoses lost sight of the human beings they seek to treat?

3 minutes

How long does it take to recover from a tragedy?

3 minutes

How does it feel to have multiple voices in your mind all the time?

11 minutes

In 2009, a man arrived in an Irish town with a plan to disappear forever

19 minutes

Each scar is different

PTSD has come to signify the moral, social and political suffering of war. But not all suffering is a mental illness

Lynne Jones

Unravelling man

Bipolar disorder can rage through life like a hurricane. So why does the US healthcare system leave us to cope alone?

Kristin Ohlson

A mad world

A diagnosis of mental illness is more common than ever – did psychiatrists create the problem, or just recognise it?

Joseph Pierre

The reality show

Schizophrenics used to see demons and spirits. Now they talk about actors and hidden cameras – and make a lot of sense

Mike Jay

Freudian slips

Verbal gaffes can profoundly challenge our sense of self, offering insight into our idiosyncrasies and desires

Jay Watts

Mad, or bad?

Even in the decade of dissent, Thomas Szasz stood alone when he attacked the idea of madness from the political right

Holly Case

An instant cure

The latest edition of the psychiatrists’ manual has decided that my personality disorder is not so bad after all

Adrian Furnham

The waterworks

Tears of sorrow, tears of joy, tears of incontinence or of ecstasy. Crying must mean something – but what?

Thomas Dixon

The id and the eco

Thinking about climate change makes people feel helpless and anxious – but that’s why we must talk about it openly

Rosemary Randall

Couched in kindness

Jakucho Setouchi is a revered nun and famous novelist, yet few know how psychoanalysis shaped her spiritual life

Christopher Harding