I think she went in intending to write one kind of book - about a reformer and his crusade to expose the tyranny of psychiatric labels - and then inadvertently ended up writing an exposé about the faulty policing of scientific research papers and the professionals who publish them. What does it mean if the great debunker of psychiatry was instead - at least, in part - "the great pretender"?Ĭahalan seems at sea at this end of this book. In fact, some of the pseudopatients and their stories seem to be made up. Her suspicions are aroused: She can't confirm some evidence supporting Rosenhan's landmark essay. These "pseudopatients" posed as people who were hearing voices that said the words "thud, empty, hollow."īut, then, Cahalan's investigation hits a snag, and then another snag. To empirically prove his thesis, he and seven volunteers - including a grad student, three psychologists and two doctors - went undercover in 12 mental health wards. Rosenhan argued that psychiatry had no sure way to distinguish the sane from the insane.
But the figure at the center of Cahalan's new book is more vexed, and as a result, The Great Pretender tells a blurrier story about diagnoses and outcomes.ĭavid Rosenhan was a professor of psychology and law at Stanford University when in 1973 he published a nine-page article in the respected journal Science called " On Being Sane in Insane Places." That article rocked the psychiatric world and, Cahalan says, continues to be one of the most cited papers in the field. Looking back on the ordeal in her latest book, The Great Pretender, Cahalan recalls:Īuthor Interviews A Young Reporter Chronicles Her 'Brain On Fire'īrain on Fire was a tense, yet ultimately reassuring read, largely because of the interventions of that one doctor who saw things others missed. After a spinal tap and biopsy of her brain, he diagnosed her with autoimmune encephalitis.Ĭahalan says that this physical diagnosis, as opposed to a psychiatric one, made all the difference. She was on the verge of being transferred to a psychiatric unit when one gifted doctor played out a hunch. Shortly thereafter, she was hospitalized, in the throes of full-blown hallucinations and paranoia.Īs Cahalan recounted in Brain on Fire, the bestselling 2012 memoir she wrote about this harrowing experience, she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and, then, with schizophrenia. In 2009, she was a young reporter for the New York Post when, one day, she began feeling like she had the flu.
Some writers search for their signature subjects Susannah Cahalan had her subject thrust upon her.
Your purchase helps support NPR programming. Close overlay Buy Featured Book Title The Great Pretender Subtitle The Undercover Mission That Changed Our Understanding of Madness Author Susannah Cahalan
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