Quote:
Originally posted by Easytiger
I would say that they're including conditions like depression, ADHD, epilepsy and so on under the blanket term of "mental illness".
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I agree with part of this, Easytiger, but my educated (as mental health counselor) guess is that they are classifying as mentally ill, people that fit the criteria based on the DSM- a manual published by the American Psychiatric Assoc., which defines all the recognized mental/emotional illnesses. This is considered the *bible* of the mental health community. As a aside, it it wasn't until the 1970's that they declassified homosexuality as a mental illness. Everything is in there, from post-traumatic stress syndrome to transvestic fetishism, sexual dysfunction to cannabis & alchohol abuse, and a whole menu of depressive disorders. It's one of my favorite books.
Mental illness is a real hot button phrase. Many of us think one must be a drooling, hallucinating, schizophrenic to be mentally ill but in truth there are very average mental illnesses, hence this 29% figure could be accurate.