Stigma Journal of Nursing

Why is Psychiatry so Taboo?

Tags: culture Mental Illness Psychiatry stigma

In almost every society, psychiatry has an adverse stigma attached to it. Any form of mental illness is perceived as a sign of weakness. In some cultures, psychiatry is not considered an important or prestigious form of medicine. To acknowledge the importance of psychotherapy is to recognize that the members of the society may have some mental abnormality. There is a thin line between sanity and insanity. So to concede that something is wrong with one' relatives is the admittance that one may be inflicted with the same disorder.