The headline on the Associated Press Business story published today in media outlets across the globe and undoubtedly read by millions reads "Schizophrenic Markets Shrug off Greek Deal."
The headline attempts to convey the volatile nature of the markets as described in the story. Financial matters aside, this headline provides yet another example of the gross miscategorization of the mentally ill in popular media. I cringe when I see words like "schizophrenia" or "bipolar" used in news stories about politics, finance or sports teams. They do nothing but contribute to misunderstanding of mental disease and stigmatization of the mentally ill.
In clinical terms Schizophrenia is a poorly defined disease without any clearly identified causal pathophysiology or basis. The truth is that mental illness takes it roots in some murky combination of physical, mental, environmental and existential/ psycho-spiritual factors. The disease schizophrenia in actuality can be given to any number of clinical syndromes and different clinicians will label different individuals with wide disparity of labels.
The nebulous nature of mental illness adds to the confusion in the mainstream about it. The debate about what if anything exactly is schizophrenia will rage on for decades, but as a matter of communication and convenience for medical billing the disease is definined in the DSM-IV as a disease of disordered thought with both positive and negative symptoms.
Positive symptoms include hallucinations (almost always auditory), delusions, paranoia and negative symptoms are things like poor communication, blunted emotional affect, inabiltity to express pleasure and poor interpersonal relationships. Not all schizophrenics have all these symptoms. In fact every one is unique in how their disease manifests itself.
In the article Carol Pepper, CEO and founder of Pepper International, a money management firm in New York is quoted saying "The market is going to continue to feel very schizophrenic. Some days it’s depressed, some days it’s excited, some days it’s terrified"
Headlines and quotes like this miscategorize and oversimplify schizophrenia. They make schizophrenia sound like a disease of raging lunacy, when in fact the diagnosis encompasses a broad range of functionality and symptomology. Emotional lability can be seen in some schizophrenics, but it is hardly the hallmark of the disease. In fact emotional apathy or bluntedness is a much more accurate depiction of its effects.
The sufferers of mental illness face tremendous adversity throughout life. They live shorter, sicker, less happy and less functional lives. They are stigmatized and misunderstood in a way that few others can understand early in life and this contributes to their suffering and illness. The last thing they need is to be further ostracized from the rest of society. The mainstream media should be more responsible about how they categorize mental illness in the headlines and quotations they publish.
Authors Challenge: please feel free to post further examples of the misrepresentation of mental illness in the mainstream media of you come across them. Here is the original link:
http://bostonherald.com/business/general/view/20120312us_edge_higher_as_europe_nears_final_greece_deal/srvc=business&position=also
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