I seem to keep finding stuff on Deinstitutionalization but I'm more interested in finding out how asylums dealt with security and mental health practices within asylums in the 70s/80s. Anybody know where I can find that kind of information?
They weren't still called asylums then, were they? They'd be mental health facilities or the psyche ward of a hospital or something.
Probably similar to how it's handled now in terms of security, although I imagine it was far less regulated. What do you mean by security and mental health practices?
I agree with Reece in needing clarification and specificity Do you mean how did they secure the building (so that patients cant leave, hurt themselves, or each other), or security as in to keep unwanted guests out? Mental Health practices like how did they treat patients? how did they admit patients? how did they care for them while they were in the facility?
Depends on the asylum. Some were pretty bad, which is why the move towards deinstitutionalisation was accelerated. The move towards smaller community mental health care was largely guided by budgets. Running giant institutions is expensive, which is why so many had a lack of trained staff, poor maintenance and regular abuse. Thankfully we don't let that happen these days...
Just watch the movie "Strange Brew"! All joking aside, if you are serious about research, try doing a search for phycologists, then find famous ones in the 1970's and 1980's and see where that path takes you. Typically everything gets changed every 10 years or so, as people in any industry like to have new ideas, and have them applied. More than likely, the famous phycologists of that time had influence on what occurred during their era. I think you will find the 1970's was a lot about shock therapy, while the 1980's was more about cutting edge drugs that were administered. In either case, forced submission was more prevalent then now because of a lack of security cameras and lawsuit happy family members.
Yep—just watch the movie One Flew Over the Cuckoo's nest (to sort of quote you ). Thought that may have been set more in the 60's, I'm not sure. But the whole movie was to expose terrible practices in mental institutions of the time.
