Disregarding Sri Lankan culture, the aid groups rushed in with their PTSD diagnostic manuals that don’t match with how Sri Lankans experience trauma. Few groups even bothered to actually register with the government or ask what kind of help the country needed. The aid groups spiraled into chaos where “rivalries broke out between counseling groups over which populations would receive which services” (Watters, 2010, p. 78). Making things even worse, what Watters termed “parachute researchers” swooped in. These researchers took advantage of the language and culture barrier to conduct research. As a result, the Sri Lankans didn’t understand they didn’t have to answer these researcher’s questions nor did they have an understanding of the risks of
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There are many parts of Zanzibar’s culture that provide a healing and forgiving environment to those with mental illness. High emotional expression, which is associated with “criticism, hostility, and emotional over-involvement,” is highly correlated with the relapsing of those with schizophrenia (Watters, 2010, p. 152). As it happens, Zanzibar has a low EE and the case studies presented in the book demonstrated that. Also, the influence of the majority Muslim religion in Zanzibar provides a perspective that illness isn’t a punishment from God and many are actually happy to have the chance to prove they’re able to accept and endure the suffering they experience. Additionally, schizophrenia is often assumed to be the result of spirit possession. Almost everyone has had a personal experience with and believes in spirit possession so it lessons the stigma for the schizophrenic (Watters, 2010, p. 157). In terms of remission, spirits are believed to leave and reappear so the individual could reenter society when they are feeling better with less …show more content…
162). European countries are also individualistic which correlates with an internal locus of control. This internal locus of control highlights personal accountability and characterizes illness as an individual failing. This results in a dehumanization of those who are mentally ill. Additionally, the West’s biomedical approach is related to the stigmatization of the mentally ill in that a study found “those who adopted the biomedical and genetic beliefs about mental illness were most often those who wanted less contact with the mentally ill or thought of them as dangerous and unpredictable” (Watters, 2010, p. 173). This perspective also reduces individual’s experiences to simply a matter of chemical imbalances. Zanzibar’s, along with other developing countries’, cultural around schizophrenia allows those affected to stay in the social in-groups whereas Western ideas ostracize the mentally ill separating them from society with little opportunity to live without
There are many parts of Zanzibar’s culture that provide a healing and forgiving environment to those with mental illness. High emotional expression, which is associated with “criticism, hostility, and emotional over-involvement,” is highly correlated with the relapsing of those with schizophrenia (Watters, 2010, p. 152). As it happens, Zanzibar has a low EE and the case studies presented in the book demonstrated that. Also, the influence of the majority Muslim religion in Zanzibar provides a perspective that illness isn’t a punishment from God and many are actually happy to have the chance to prove they’re able to accept and endure the suffering they experience. Additionally, schizophrenia is often assumed to be the result of spirit possession. Almost everyone has had a personal experience with and believes in spirit possession so it lessons the stigma for the schizophrenic (Watters, 2010, p. 157). In terms of remission, spirits are believed to leave and reappear so the individual could reenter society when they are feeling better with less …show more content…
162). European countries are also individualistic which correlates with an internal locus of control. This internal locus of control highlights personal accountability and characterizes illness as an individual failing. This results in a dehumanization of those who are mentally ill. Additionally, the West’s biomedical approach is related to the stigmatization of the mentally ill in that a study found “those who adopted the biomedical and genetic beliefs about mental illness were most often those who wanted less contact with the mentally ill or thought of them as dangerous and unpredictable” (Watters, 2010, p. 173). This perspective also reduces individual’s experiences to simply a matter of chemical imbalances. Zanzibar’s, along with other developing countries’, cultural around schizophrenia allows those affected to stay in the social in-groups whereas Western ideas ostracize the mentally ill separating them from society with little opportunity to live without