The Transition from Institutional to Social Adjustment

HE PROBLEMS of the mental hospital which are of interest for the sociologist fall into three main groups. The first includes those processes which take place before the patient is committed; the second, those which take place in the hospital; the third, those which function to release the patient from the hospital and rehabilitate him to his family and community. The mental hospital is designed as a temporary place of treatment and cure. Convalescents are released to the community where they must assume responsibilities, where good readjustment demands assuming a good many responsibilities, and considerable initiative. This paper will deal with the transition from adjustment in the mental hospital to readjustment in the family and community. It will point out some of the factors which may facilitate or hinder the transition. The hospital and community environments differ in their demands upon the individual; adjustment in the hospital does not assure adjustment in the community. It is a common experience in psychiatric practice that a patient may get along very well in the hospital but when he is released, his previous symptoms may reappear. Such a patient is normal so long as he lives in the simple and protected environment of the hospital, but he is not yet sufficiently well to cope with the complex outside environment. Community readjustment demands more than a mere hospital adjustment. Hospital language substantiates the difference between adjustment to the hospital and readjustment outside. In addition to complete recovery, one uses the term recovery, which refers to patients who can get along very well in the family and community and no longer need the protective care of the mental hospital. That is, they are recoveries even though they did not achieve a restitution in integrum. Psychotic symptoms such as hallucinations and delusions may still be present, but the patient is able to hide and to a certain degree control them so that other people are not unduly aware of these symptoms. Another term, recovery, refers to patients who can get along as well as the recoveries, but only in hospital environment. In mental hospital practice, the difficulty of transition from institutional to social adjustment is well recognized. The hospital uses parole and visits to facilitate the transition. Parole is characterized by some freedom and concurrent responsibility. It does not differ greatly from the parole systems of reformatories and penal institutions, which also have recognized the difference between adjustments. A patient on parole has access to the hospital grounds and facilities

Demographic economics · Economics · Political science · Sociology · Transition (genetics · Chemistry · Mental Health and Psychiatry · Mental Health Treatment and Access · Psychology · Social Psychology

• The History and Future of the Sociology of Therapy

  Open Access•J Huft•The American Sociologist•2022

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