Movies and Mental Illness: Using Films to Understand Psychotherapy / Edition 2

by Danny Wedding, Mary Ann Boyd, Ryan M. Niemiec

Overview

Designed as a supplemental to core texts in abnormal psychology, this work by Wedding (Missouri Institute of Mental Health, School of Medicine, U. of Missouri-Columbia), Boyd (School of Nursing, Southern Illinois U. Edwardsville), and Niemiec (St. Louis Behavioral Medicine Institute, School of Medicine, St. Louis U.) use Hollywood and other films to illustrate clinical aspects of psychopathology. Each chapter focuses on a particular family of psychopathology, beginning with a fictive "case history" drawn from a well known film and including description of specific disorders with very brief references to characters and situations from other films. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780889372924
Publisher:	Hogrefe Publishing
Publication date:	08/28/2005
Edition description:	REV
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	7.08(w) x 10.02(h) x 0.69(d)

Editorial Reviews

Reviewer: Brett C. Plyler, M.D.(Northwestern Memorial Hospital)
Description: This book covers a wide variety of psychopathology and uses film as medium to help understand the different ones.
Purpose: The purpose is to help students learn psychopathology through the use of movies. These are worthy objectives and the book meets them.
Audience: It is written for both instructors and students of psychopathology and film by authors who are credible authorities.
Features: This book explores a wide variety of psychopathology from anxiety disorders to personality disorders to mental retardation through the use of movies. Each chapter takes a fictional case study of a movie character and examines this and other films that help explain the particular psychological issue at hand. An appendix of films with short descriptions explores each disorder that allows for quick reference of a film needed to demonstrate an illness. There are some editorial miscues on some of the charts.
Assessment: This is an interesting book that could be very useful as a teaching tool for both instructors and students of any level. It would definitely get students more involved and make it easier for them to understand and remember various psychopathologies. The case studies are fairly well done and they explore each disorder in depth. This second edition includes sleep, eating disorders, violence which all seem to be important additions. The book is fun to read as well, and I enjoyed reviewing it.

Doody's Review Service

3 Stars from Doody