On Being Sanne In Insane Places By David L. Rosenhan

“On Being Sane In Insane Places” by David L. Rosenhan examines different experiments on whether or not someone can be mistreated due to the fact that they are labeled sane or insane. There is normality and abnormality, but is there really sane and insane? According to Rosenhan, he conducted an experiment with a few others who pretended to have schizophrenia. They were admitted to a mental hospital, and were asked to do various tasks to keep an eye on them. One of these tasks was writing inside a notebook to keep track of what they were thinking, and what went on inside their head. To “normal” people, writing in a notebook can be a habit of boredom or creativity. However, since Rosenhan was thought to have schizophrenia, his writings were

The way the pseudo patients put themselves through weeks of constant medical examination was something I found to be rather shocking. There is no way I’d ever check myself into a mental institution willingly, especially after reading this article. I really enjoyed how dedicated Dr. Rosenhan and his team were, mainly because it seemed so necessary at the time this experiment had taken place. One thing I didn’t enjoy, however, was the fact that they had to actually pretend to have these symptoms, when there were real patients within the hospital who actually suffer from the real thing. I could only imagine the anger they had towards the researchers, because it would almost seem as if they were mocking them. If Dr. Rosenhan were to do this study again in today’s society, I would love to see the reaction. Not only would people most likely hate him, he would probably be so infamous that he’d lose his job. The only way he could possibly conduct such an experiment today, would be for him to study real patients, and examine how they’re being treated within the

Why would the hospital discharge the pseudo patients with “schizophrenia in remission” without any further examination? Wouldn’t that be considered malpractice?

2) The words sane and insane are used quite often throughout the text. Why is our definition of sanity and insanity different from those who live in remote islands around the world? Is cannibalism considered to be insanity across the world?

3) On page 217, Dr. Rosenhan talks about the overlying cause of labeling. Why can some people be labeled as depressed or bipolar, but others aren’t allowed to be labeled as