Handbook of Mental Health and Mental Disorder Among Black Americans

Subjects:

• Psychology » Psychology (General)
• Multicultural Studies » Black Studies

Reviews:

• This handbook brings together crucial information related to mental illness among black Americans by examining the impact of social structures and conditions on the mental health of blacks. An initial overview chapter by Alvin Poussaint is dated in that it does not discuss the impact of crack cocaine and AIDS on the functioning of the black community. Even without these bleak new social factors, however, the chapter provides grim news: by any measurable standard the mental health of black Americans is in serious decline. Alcoholism represents one of their most serious mental health problems because it is associated with violent behavior. Drug abuse is a particularly insidious problem not only because of the number of deaths clearly linked to its usage, but also because of the social problems associated with its prevalence. Poussaint concludes that the social conditions faced by black Americans--poverty, racism, unemployment, female-headed households, illegitimacy, and the increasing divorce rate--place blacks at high risk for 'mental disorder, crime and family and community breakdown.' Other chapters examine the effects of racism on the development of stress and coping styles; ethnic and cultural factors as they relate to the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness; and the positive mental health attributes of blacks. Upper-division and graduate collections.
  —Choice

Table of Contents:

• Foreword by James P. Comer
• Preface
• Introduction by Dorothy S. Ruiz
• Health and Social Status of Black Americans
• Social and Economic Profile of Black Americans, 1989 by Dorothy S. Ruiz
• The Mental Health Status of Black Americans, 1983 by Alvin F. Poussaint
• Epidemiological Perspectives and Issues
• The Epidemiology of Mental Disorder in the Black Population by Harold W. Neighbors and Suzan Lumpkin
• Depression among Blacks: An Epidemiologic Perspective by Diane Robinson Brown
• Suicide Trends of Blacks and Whites by Sex and Age, United States, 1967-1986 by Jacquelyne Johnson Jackson
• Racism and Mental Health
• Black Mental Health and Racial Oppression by Joycelyn Landrum-Brown
• Stress, Coping, and Social Support: Their Effects on Black Women by Patricia J. Dunston
• Psychiatric Diagnosis and Treatment
• Ethnic and Cultural Factors in Psychiatric Diagnosis and Treatment by James L. Collins, Eliot Sorel, Joseph Brent, and Clyde B. Mathura
• Social Factors in Diagnosis and Treatment by Clyde B. Mathura and Melanie A. Baer
• Family and Community Violence
• Understanding Family Violence: An Afrocentric Analysis Based on Optimal Theory by Linda James Myers
• Black-on-Black Homicide: The Implications for Black Mental Health by Carl C. Bell
• Legal and Social Policy Issues
• Legal Issues in Mental Health by Alice Gresham Bullock
• Mental Health and Social Policy by Mary S. Harper
• Positive Mental Health
• Psychosocial Competence: Toward a Theory of Understanding Positive Mental Health among Black Americans by Louis P. Anderson, Chuck L. Eaddy, and Ernestine A. Williams
• Coping with Color: The Anatomy of Positive Mental Health by Barbara J. Shade
• Factors Contributing to Positive Mental Health in Black Americans by Anderson J. Franklin and James S. Jackson
• Selected Bibliography
• Index