Psychiatry and Psychology in the USSR

Psychiatry and Psychology in the USSR
Author: Samuel Corson
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 297
Release: 2012-12-06
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 1461342988

This book is aimed at a professional audience of psychiatrists, psychologists, and educators, as well as Slavic studies scholars and teachers and intelligent lay readers. It would be presumptious to attempt to cover the entire field of Soviet psychiatry and psychology in one modest volume. During the past several decades there has been a remarkable flourishing and diversification of research in psychology and psychiatry in the USSR. What we have attempted to do in this symposium is to present a constructive critical overview of certain limited areas by arranging an interchange of observations and ideas between several American scientists knowledgeable in these fields and a psychologist and psychiatrist who obtained their education and working experience in the USSR. We hope to be able to expand such symposia in the future, so as to cover other important areas of these disciplines. This monograph presents an eyewitness account of Pavlov by W. Horsley Gantt, one of three surviving students of Pavlov, and, to the best of my knowledge, the only American who actually studied and worked with Pavlov. It is a measure of Dr. Gantt's devotion to the development of scientific psychiatry that he went to the USSR to spend six years in Pavlov's laboratory at a time of extreme economic hardship and political turmoil in that country and in the face of having to master a difficult language. In his presentation, Dr.

Psychiatry and Psychology in the USSR

Psychiatry and Psychology in the USSR
Author: Samuel Corson
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 296
Release: 1976-12-01
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 9780306309922

This book is aimed at a professional audience of psychiatrists, psychologists, and educators, as well as Slavic studies scholars and teachers and intelligent lay readers. It would be presumptious to attempt to cover the entire field of Soviet psychiatry and psychology in one modest volume. During the past several decades there has been a remarkable flourishing and diversification of research in psychology and psychiatry in the USSR. What we have attempted to do in this symposium is to present a constructive critical overview of certain limited areas by arranging an interchange of observations and ideas between several American scientists knowledgeable in these fields and a psychologist and psychiatrist who obtained their education and working experience in the USSR. We hope to be able to expand such symposia in the future, so as to cover other important areas of these disciplines. This monograph presents an eyewitness account of Pavlov by W. Horsley Gantt, one of three surviving students of Pavlov, and, to the best of my knowledge, the only American who actually studied and worked with Pavlov. It is a measure of Dr. Gantt's devotion to the development of scientific psychiatry that he went to the USSR to spend six years in Pavlov's laboratory at a time of extreme economic hardship and political turmoil in that country and in the face of having to master a difficult language. In his presentation, Dr.

State of Madness

State of Madness
Author: Rebecca Reich
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Total Pages: 401
Release: 2018-03-13
Genre: History
ISBN: 1609092333

What madness meant was a fiercely contested question in Soviet society. State of Madness examines the politically fraught collision between psychiatric and literary discourses in the years after Joseph Stalin's death. State psychiatrists deployed set narratives of mental illness to pathologize dissenting politics and art. Dissidents such as Aleksandr Vol'pin, Vladimir Bukovskii, and Semen Gluzman responded by highlighting a pernicious overlap between those narratives and their life stories. The state, they suggested in their own psychiatrically themed texts, had crafted an idealized view of reality that itself resembled a pathological work of art. In their unsanctioned poetry and prose, the writers Joseph Brodsky, Andrei Siniavskii, and Venedikt Erofeev similarly engaged with psychiatric discourse to probe where creativity ended and insanity began. Together, these dissenters cast themselves as psychiatrists to a sick society. By challenging psychiatry's right to declare them or what they wrote insane, dissenters exposed as a self-serving fiction the state's renewed claims to rationality and modernity in the post-Stalin years. They were, as they observed, like the child who breaks the spell of collective delusion in Hans Christian Andersen's story "The Emperor's New Clothes." In a society where normality means insisting that the naked monarch is clothed, it is the truth-teller who is pathologized. Situating literature's encounter with psychiatry at the center of a wider struggle over authority and power, this bold interdisciplinary study will appeal to literary specialists; historians of culture, science, and medicine; and scholars and students of the Soviet Union and its legacy for Russia today.

Cold War in Psychiatry

Cold War in Psychiatry
Author: Robert Van Voren
Publisher: Brill / Rodopi
Total Pages: 512
Release: 2010-01-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 9789042030480

For 20 years Soviet psychiatric abuse dominated the agenda of the World Psychiatric Association. It ended only after the Soviet Foreign Ministry intervened.Cold War in Psychiatry tells the full story for the first time and from inside, among others on basis of extensive reports by Stasi and KGB – who were the secret actors, what were the hidden factors?Based on a wealth of new evidence and documentation as well as interviews with many of the main actors, including leading Western psychiatrists, Soviet dissidents and Soviet and East German key figures, the book describes the issue in all its complexity and puts it in a broader context. In the book opposite sides find common ground and a common understanding of what actually happened.

Child Psychiatry in the Soviet Union

Child Psychiatry in the Soviet Union
Author: Nancy Rollins
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 332
Release: 1972
Genre: Child health services
ISBN: 9780674114753

In the first extensive American study of child psychiatry in the Soviet Union, Dr. Nancy Rollins explains that her aim is two-fold: to expand knowledge of the theory, diagnosis, and treatment of psychiatric disorders of children and adolescents and to stimulate a professional dialogue. Her attainment of this goal is clearly evidenced here by means of her astute assessment of the findings of her four-month visit to Russia as an individual investigator on the Medical Cultural Exchange program. The author's basic concern about the relationship between a society's child-rearing practices, character formation, and psychiatric disorder propelled her to ponder such questions as: Is there a describable difference between the Soviet conscience and the American conscience, as it develops during the years of childhood and adolescence? What about the problems of sexual identity in the two societies? Identity crises? Why have Soviet psychiatrists and educators remained so consistently anti-Freudian? In addressing herself to the various questions that intrigued her, Dr. Rollins first considers the history of Soviet psychiatric thought, with the major influences shaping the direction of Soviet child psychiatry and the social perspective with personal impressions of Soviet culture and society. Ensuing chapters, based upon first-hand observations and case material, take a close look at such topics as the organization of psychiatric services, diagnosis, general treatment methods, special psychotherapy, research, and psychiatric training programs. The author's reactions to the people she encountered in children's psychoneurological hospitals, polyclinics, sanatoria, and research institutions contributes a lively dimension to this impressive work. The study points out some differences between Soviet and American treatment methods; for example, Soviet treatment aims at inducing peace and relaxation in the patient, whereas American methods encourage exposure to and mastery of conflicts and tolerance of anxiety. Dr. Rollins also offers suggestions for further study and reflects on the relation of psychiatry and culture in the two countries.

Present-Day Russian Psychology

Present-Day Russian Psychology
Author: Neil O'Connor
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 218
Release: 2013-10-22
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 1483148572

Present-Day Russian Psychology: A Symposium by Seven Authors comprises the first comprehensive survey of Russian psychological literature that provides a sympathetic but critical account of Soviet psychology. This book focuses on three trends in Soviet psychology — first is the Pavlovian studies of conditioning and central nervous type; second are studies of verbal behavior; and third is the Georgian “set theory. The chapters in this compilation include a statement on the orienting reflex and the voluntary control of motor behavior; survey of psychiatry; and view of the use of information theory and its increased popularity. Review of abnormal psychology and psychotherapy; analysis of psycholinguistic psychology; review of studies of child development; and account of a personal visit to Russian laboratories are also discussed. This publication is beneficial to psychology students and individuals researching on Soviet psychology.

Cold War in Psychiatry

Cold War in Psychiatry
Author: Robert van Voren
Publisher: Rodopi
Total Pages: 512
Release: 2010-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 9789042030466

For 20 years Soviet psychiatric abuse dominated the agenda of the World Psychiatric Association. It ended only after the Soviet Foreign Ministry intervened. Cold War in Psychiatry tells the full story for the first time and from inside, among others on basis of extensive reports by Stasi and KGB ¿ who were the secret actors, what were the hidden factors? Based on a wealth of new evidence and documentation as well as interviews with many of the main actors, including leading Western psychiatrists, Soviet dissidents and Soviet and East German key figures, the book describes the issue in all its complexity and puts it in a broader context. In the book opposite sides find common ground and a common understanding of what actually happened. ¿The use of psychiatry to silence political dissenters was undoubtedly one of the most pernicious sides of the Soviet regime. No wonder that the leaders of perestroika believed that stopping this criminal practice was one of the most urgent priorities. Robert van Voren¿s book is the very first full investigation of this problem. I highly recommend this book.¿ Anatoly Adamishin, former Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the USSR ¿Robert van Voren writes history in an innovative, effective, and vivid way. He weaves into the story of Western responses to the abuse of psychiatry in the USSR his probingly personal interviews with key players. Apart from presenting a skillfully interwoven succession of personal and institutional dramas, this book will also be valuable to students of the varied ways in which international professional bodies succeed or fail at upholding ethical standards of behavior by their members. In sum, this fast-paced and readable book combines the fruits of painstaking archival research with episodes of high-voltage human interest. It's hard to put down.¿ Peter Reddaway, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, George Washington University Robert van Voren (1959), a Sovietologist by education, has been a human rights activist since 1977 with a special interest in mental health issues. He is Chief Executive of the Global Initiative on Psychiatry (GIP) and has written extensively on Soviet issues and, in particular, issues related to mental health and human rights, and published a dozen books. His memoirs, On Dissidents and Madness, were published by Rodopi in 2009.