Reconceptualizing Mental Illness In The Digital Age

The Digital Age has changed everything. Mental illness is nothing like what it was even twenty years ago. Since the advent of the Internet, suicide rates have soared. Depression has become the single most debilitating disease in the world. The majority of people who go to their doctor, to an emergency department, and to urgent care have no discernible physical disease. Roughly half of all adults in Western countries struggle with at least one addiction. We now live in a 24/7 miasma of media bombardment, of neuro-saturation, and of mental exhaustion. Technology has obliterated the human mind’s ability to keep up, and in this brave new world it is time for an honest and forthright reassessment of both mental illness and mental wellness. This book elegantly describes how we got to this point, the culmination of different historical perspectives on mental illness, and the evolution of the digital disorders of our time. It offers a reconsideration of normal versus pathological, and the possibility and desirability of achieving mental wellness in a digital environment.

The Digital Age has changed everything. Mental illness is nothing like what it was even twenty years ago. Since the advent of the Internet, suicide rates have soared. Depression has become the single most debilitating disease in the world. The majority of people who go to their doctor, to an emergency department, and to urgent care have no discernible physical disease. Roughly half of all adults in Western countries struggle with at least one addiction. We now live in a 24/7 miasma of media bombardment, of neuro-saturation, and of mental exhaustion. Technology has obliterated the human mind's ability to keep up, and in this brave new world it is time for an honest and forthright reassessment of both mental illness and mental wellness. This book elegantly describes how we got to this point, the culmination of different historical perspectives on mental illness, and the evolution of the digital disorders of our time. It offers a reconsideration of normal versus pathological, and the possibility and desirability of achieving mental wellness in a digital environment.

Reconceptualizing Mental Illness in the Viral Age: Souls in the Machine reframes the pop-culture milieu of the current state of mental illness and mental wellness in the post-COVID era. The profound psychological trauma left in the wake of the neuro-exhaustion engendered by this explosive epoch has created the perfect atmosphere, cybersphere, for another historical 'Great Awakening'. Previously, infectious ideas infrequently led to moral and psychological upheaval. However, with mass, social, and popular media now comprising the psychosocial milieu from which emerge today's social contagions the speed, ease, and facility with which ideas infect and commandeer the cybersphere is so profound as to be mentally devastating. Techno-psychopathologies have hyper-evolved. In an age of overwhelming distraction and irresistible technology, the one certainty amid the chaos is that the current standard of conceptualizing mental illness, through checklist diagnostics, has been outdated since the digital era began. The human mind is now fundamentally different.

The Internet and related technologies have reconfigured every aspect of life, including mental health. Although the negative and positive effects of digital technology on mental health have been debated, all too often this has been done with much passion and few or no supporting data. In Mental Health in the Digital Age, Elias Aboujaoude and Vladan Starcevic have edited a book that brings together distinguished experts from around the world to review the evidence relating to this area. The first part of the book addresses threats resulting from the growing reliance on, and misuse of, digital technology; it also looks at how some problematic behaviors and forms of psychopathology have been shaped by this technology. This section reviews problematic Internet and video game use, effects of violent video games on the levels of aggression and of online searches for health-related information on the levels of health anxiety, use of digital technology to harm other people, and promotion of suicide on the Internet. The second part of Mental Health in the Digital Age examines the ways in which digital technology has boosted efforts to help people with mental health problems. These include the use of computers, the Internet, and mobile phones to educate and provide information necessary for psychiatric treatment and to produce programs for psychological therapy, as well as use of electronic mental health records to improve care. Mental Health in the Digital Age is a unique and timely book because it examines comprehensively an intersection between digital technology and mental health and provides a state-of-the-art, evidence-based, and well-balanced look at the field. The book is a valuable resource and guide to an area often shrouded in controversy, as it is a work of critical thinking that separates the hype from the facts and offers data-driven conclusions. It is of interest particularly to mental health professionals, but also to general audience.

The Virtuous Physician: A Brief Medical History of Moral Inquiry from Hippocrates to COVID-19 traces the origin and development of practical moral inquiry as viewed through a lens of medical history. The cornerstone of the book is a translation of, and commentary on, the second century BC pseudo-Hippocratic Greek text, Precepts, a work not translated into English since 1921, which introduces the idea of the ‘virtuous physician’, and the ‘art’ of medicine. Preceptsdescribes the ideal way of being of the physician, and a pragmatic, very modern code of ethics. Through the examination of other early texts the book locates the physician as a seminal figure in ancient society, first with religious significance, and later with increasingly philosophico-intellectual meaning, the physical embodiment of the search for moral-pragmatic professional standardization. This inquiry is put to the test as applied to the existential threat and crisis of the COVID-19 pandemic. The new, updated translation of Precepts makes the book interesting to classicists; and the detailed discussion of the cross-cultural influences between East and West in the Ancient World, especially of the influence of the Ancient Near East on Greek and Roman thought, to historians. It provides an outline of the history of the field for bioethicists and biomedical ethicists, and a seminal reference piece for physicians, from which to ground their own daily decision-making. It can be seen as a more valuable guide than the Hippocratic Oath, in this regard.

This second edition of this highly impactful book examines the intersection of mental health and digital technology to make informed decisions about the new options provided by digital technology. It highlights the rise in online therapy and social media and examines the ethical dilemmas involved in online research to suggest that the benefits created far outweigh the possible risks. This expanded and updated second edition, includes practical suggestions for clinicians and public, builds upon the first by updating readers on recent developments in technology and research in this area since 2015. It explores ways in which governments and practitioners responded to the mental health crisis caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, and looks at the challenges as well as the benefits of our increasing interaction online.

This book broadens the idea of a safe space that is traditionally discussed in feminist studies, to include gendered identities intersecting with class, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, and ability within multiple aspects of education. This collection showcases work supporting access to education of persistently marginalized individuals.

Ethical Dimensions of Commercial and DIY Neurotechnologies Volume Three, the latest release in the Developments in Neuroethics and Bioethics series, highlights new advances in the field, with this new volume presenting interesting chapters on timely topics surrounding neuroethics and bioethics. Each chapter is written by an international board of authors. Provides the authority and expertise of leading contributors from an international board of authors Presents the latest release in the Developments in Neuroethics and Bioethics series Includes the latest information on the ethics of commercial and DIY neurotechnologies