Human Agency and Mental Illness

Datos Bibliográficos

ID21159618
AutoresMargarita A Mooney, Margarita Mooney (Princeton Theological Seminary, autor de correspondencia)
Año2016
Volumen15
Número4
Páginas376-390
Fecha de publicación2016-08-07
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaJournal of Critical Realism (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1476-7430 • E-ISSN: 1572-5138
EditorialInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14767430.2016.1193675
OpenAlexW2464490286
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas2
Referencias citadas15

How might critical realism provide a better metatheoretical framework to understand the complex causality behind experiences of mental illness? How do we understand the agency of people suffering from mental illness? Prior work on critical realism and disability has argued that critical realism helps move past one or another form of reductionist explanations for illness, whether that is biological, environmental or psychological. But using a critical realist framework to study mental illness also raises issues about the agency of people whose rational capacities are thought to be diminished. In this article, I present the life history of one of 26 young adults I interviewed as part of a project on resilience. Because interviews reveal the complex causal forces in any person's life, they remind us that scientific explanations should not be reductionistic. Human agency can be diminished by biological illness, power structures in psychiatry, and cultural categories of mental illness diagnoses. But a critical realist framework allows me to explore how people who experience mental illness still exercise their capacity to reflect on the moral ends to which to direct their actions

Epistemology · Mental health · Mental illness · Psychiatry · Realism · Reductionism · Social science · Sociology · Critical Realism in Sociology · Psychology · Social and Cultural Dynamics · Social Policy and Reform Studies · Social Psychology