The meanings and causes of hearing voices that others cannot hear (auditory verbal hallucinations, in psychiatric parlance) have been debated for thousands of years. Voice-hearing has been both revered and condemned, understood as a symptom of disease as well as a source of otherworldly communication. Those hearing voices have been viewed as mystics, potential psychiatric patients or simply just people with unusual experiences, and have been beatified, esteemed or accepted, as well as drug...

F****or humanity to survive there must always be people performing the minute-to-minute miracle of thought.'Excellent and beyond timely.' A. C. GraylingScientific advances and new technologies are letting others manipulate our minds more easily than ever before. Now, those tasked with protecting our minds are finally preparing to fight back. As we speak, the United Nations is seeking to pin down a concrete right to free thought and enshrine...

Spite angers and enrages us, but it also keeps us honest. In this provocative account, a psychologist examines how petty vengeance explains human thriving.Spite seems utterly useless. You don't gain anything by hurting yourself just so you can hurt someone else. So why hasn't evolution weeded out all the spiteful people?As psychologist Simon McCarthy-Jones argues, spite seems pointless because we're looking at it wrong. Spite isn't just what we feel when a ...

The experience of 'hearing voices', once associated with lofty prophetic communications, has fallen low. Today, the experience is typically portrayed as an unambiguous harbinger of madness caused by a broken brain, an unbalanced mind, biology gone wild. Yet an alternative account, forged predominantly by people who hear voices themselves, argues that hearing voices is an understandable response to traumatic life-events. There is an urgent need to overcome the tensions between these two way...

This book draws on clinical research findings from the last three decades to offer a review of current psychological theories and therapeutic approaches to understanding and treating auditory hallucinations, addressing key methodological issues that need to be considered in evaluating interventions.Mark Hayward, Clara Strauss and Simon McCarthy-Jones present a historical narrative on lessons learnt, the evolution of evidence bases, and an agenda for the future. The text also provid...

Are we born with our fears or do we learn them? Why do our fears persist? What purpose does anxiety serve? How common are anxiety disorders, and which treatments are most effective? What's happening in our brain when we feel fear? And what are Colombian worry dolls? This Very Short Introduction draws on the best scientific research to offer a highly accessible explanation of what anxiety is, why it is such a normal and vital part of our emotional life, and the key factors that cau...

Psychosis as a Personal Crisis seeks to challenge the way people who hear voices are both viewed and treated. This book emphasises the individual variation between people who suffer from psychosis and puts forward the idea that hearing voices is not in itself a sign of mental illness.In this book the editors bring together an international range of expert contributors, who in their daily work, their research or their personal acquaintance, focus on the personal experience ...

Are hallucinations and delusions really symptoms of an illness called ‘schizophrenia’? Are mental health problems really caused by chemical imbalances and genetic predispositions? Are psychiatric drugs as effective and safe as the drug companies claim? Is madness preventable?This second edition of Models of Madness challenges those who hold to simplistic, pessimistic and often damaging theories and treatments of madness. In particular it challenges beliefs that madness can...

Extensive scientific research has been conducted into understanding and learning more about psychotic experiences. However, in existing research the voice of subjective experience is rarely taken into consideration. In this book, first-person accounts are brought centre-stage and examined alongside current research to suggest how personal experience can contribute to professional understanding, and therefore the treatment, of psychosis.Experiencing Psychosis brings togethe...

This book examines how counsellors and psychotherapists interact with those clients who may suffer from mental health issues. While practising counsellors and psychotherapists meet clients who have problems across the entire mental health spectrum, there are a number of particular disorders that these practitioners are particularly likely to encounter. These include anxiety, depression, stress, addiction, phobias and behavioural problems. In this book, all of these conditions are explained...

Can early, need-adapted treatment prevent the long-terms effects of psychosis?How important is phase-specific treatment?Evolving Psychosis explores the success of psycho-social treatments for psychosis in helping patients recover more quickly and stay well longer.Mental health professionals from all over the world share their clinical experience and scientific findings to shed new light on the issues surrou...

Psychiatry suffers a lot of criticism, not least from within its own scientifically founded medical world. This book provides an account of mental health difficulties and how they are generally addressed in conventional medical circles, alongside critical reviews of the assumptions underpinning them to encourage more humanitarian perspectives.