In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
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Re: In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
#2This is an interesting article on a potentially interesting (but paywalled (anyone have a link?) study.
> 20 patients with schizophrenia in San Mateo, California,
One of the criteria for treatment (at least in the UK) would be "Does this interfere with your day to day life?" Friendly voices would tend to not meet that criteria. Modern treatment should include developing ways to live with the voices, rather than just medicating them out.
I'd be interested to see what happens if you include people who hear voices but who are not patients. I know a few people who hear voices, but who describe them as usually okay and only occasionally distressing. They describe similar "providing useful advice" experiences.
Here's someone who describes what hearing voices is like (he hears mostly external voices - a voice which sounds exactly like someone is standing behind you, talking to you, except there isn't anyone there) and an internal voice. He describes some of these as distressing and frustrating, but he talks about the first experiences as being friendly. And that, from the little bit I've heard, is a reasonably common experience even in the west.
(He talks about some distressing events from his childhood, so go careful)
Re: In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
#3Further reading: The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind - Julian Jaynes
A beautifully written book about an excentric theory of the history of consciousness.
Re: In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
#4This is an interesting article on a potentially interesting (but paywalled (anyone have a link?) study. > 20 patients with schizophrenia in San Mateo, California, One of the criteria for treatment (at least in the UK) would be "Does this interfere with your day to day life?" Friendly voices would tend to not meet that criteria. Modern treatment should include developing ways to live with the voices, rather than just…
Also related:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hearing_Voices_Movement
...which (if I understand correctly) seeks to de-stigmatize/re-characterize the hearing-of-voices as something that's not necessarily an illness requiring a cure, but a condition of mixed-utility to be coped with.
Re: In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
#5Well, some obvious probable historic figures who may have had more supportive cultural backgrounds include
- Abraham, whose voice first said kill your son, then changed its mind.
- Joan of Arc - who gave surprisingly good military advice
- presumably every "spirit guide"
There must be more examples, but hard to think of them
Re: In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
#6Fun fact: One charge against Socrates, the founder of western philosophy, for which he was put to death, was for hearing voices... that weren't Greek gods, but were 'other gods.' And talking about it. Preaching other gods being punishable by... death.
Re: In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
#7Hearing voices in itself is not a symptom of an illness. Even in our culture some people cope really well with hearing voices. For example lonely old people may feel that they have company when they hear voices.
Some facts:
http://www.intervoiceonline.org/about-voices/essential-facts
Re: In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
#8http://lesswrong.com/lw/dr/generalizing_from_one_example/
Nice article on the differences between people's "style of thinking". It takes visual mental imagery as an example, and I can see auditory hallucinations being on a very similar spectrum (if you take away the stigma). In the visualization debate non-visual thinkers often report being able to visualize in a hypnagogic state (right before falling asleep), which is also the state in which (surprisingly many) people experience auditory hallucinations.
Re: In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
#9Hearing voices in itself is not a symptom of an illness. Even in our culture some people cope really well with hearing voices. For example lonely old people may feel that they have company when they hear voices. Some facts: http://www.intervoiceonline.org/about-voices/essential-facts
It depends on how you define illness. Something can have no negative effects and still be wrong. Compare a missing small toe, perhaps.
>Between 70 and 90 cent of people who hear voices do so following traumatic events.
That sort of implies that things are not 100% okay in there.
Re: In Some Cultures People with Schizophrenia Like the Voices They Hear
#10I have a theory that schizophrenic voices are actually one's own suppressed will or access to the subconscious in compromised or traumatized individuals, or possibly communication with the recessive hemisphere of the brain.
I'd like to learn more about psychiatry to really understand what we know (or think we know) about schizophrenia.