Dave Harper
University of East London, School of Psychology, Faculty Member
ABSTRACT
Research Interests:
Most psychologists' knowledge of mental health is limited to what they remember from undergraduate 'abnormal psychology'courses. Yet a recent survey we conducted, funded by the Higher Education Academy Psychology Network... more
Most psychologists' knowledge of mental health is limited to what they remember from undergraduate 'abnormal psychology'courses. Yet a recent survey we conducted, funded by the Higher Education Academy Psychology Network (Cromby et al., in press) found that the vast majority of these courses use textbooks structured by the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders; present very dated critiques of psychiatry; and fail to develop a specifically psychological approach to their ...
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
This paper is made available online in accordance with publisher policies. Please scroll down to view the document itself. Please refer to the repository record for this item and our policy information available from the repository home... more
This paper is made available online in accordance with publisher policies. Please scroll down to view the document itself. Please refer to the repository record for this item and our policy information available from the repository home page for further information. To see the final version of this paper please visit the publisher’s website. Access to the published version may require a subscription. Author(s): Harper, David J.
Research Interests:
Little is known about ordinary people’s understandings of conspiracy beliefs and how these understandings relate to the perspectives of researchers and scholars. Working within a social constructionist epistemological framework, we... more
Little is known about ordinary people’s understandings of conspiracy beliefs and how these understandings relate to the perspectives of researchers and scholars. Working within a social constructionist epistemological framework, we conducted a Q-methodology study aiming to identify a range of lay perspectives on two key topics: the defining features of conspiracy beliefs; and aspects considered important in judging their plausibility. Fifty-six people (32 men and 24 women), recruited via regional UK Facebook groups, sorted their agreement with a set of statements on each of the two topics. A principal component analysis, followed by varimax rotation, was performed on each data set. Five accounts about the defining features of conspiracy beliefs were identified: that they are false, illogical and harmful; that they are forms of political critique; that there are varied types; that they are entertaining but ineffectual; and that they are held by a self-reinforcing minority. Four accounts about their evaluation were identified: conventional realist criteria; the importance of personal judgement; skeptical realism; and the assessment of critical thinking. The findings are discussed in the context of the literature and limitations of the study are considered. Implications for research and educational and policy interventions are outlined.
Research Interests:
Cover piece for the psychologist
Research Interests:
This chapter begins by noting that the majority of the research reviewed originates from the Global North and that it tends to adopt an implicitly biomedical framework, to utilise psychiatric diagnostic categories in an uncritical manner... more
This chapter begins by noting that the majority of the research reviewed originates from the Global North and that it tends to adopt an implicitly biomedical framework, to utilise psychiatric diagnostic categories in an uncritical manner and draws heavily on stigma-based conceptualisations. The extent of mental health discrimination against those with psychiatric diagnoses is discussed including research on public attitudes. A number of causal factors are reviewed, including the role of the media. However, it is argued that biomedically-oriented and stigma-based conceptualisations are problematic and that a perspective focused on epistemic injustice is preferable. Extracts from a qualitative study based on interviews with mental health service users are presented, illustrating how people with psychiatric diagnoses respond to prejudice and discrimination and the varied strategies they use to manage it. Interventions to counter prejudice and discrimination are reviewed with a focus on their underlying conceptual assumptions (e.g. comparing biomedically-oriented and psychosocially-oriented approaches). The chapter ends with a discussion of potential future avenues for research and practice.
Research Interests:
Over recent decades a research programme involving nonclinical samples has provided a justification for the use of normalising practices within cognitive behaviour therapy for psychosis. These studies have found that, contrary to... more
Over recent decades a research programme involving nonclinical samples has provided a justification for the use of normalising practices within cognitive behaviour therapy for psychosis. These studies have found that, contrary to mainstream psychiatric assumptions, beliefs considered delusional are neither rare in the general population nor qualitatively different from “nondelusional” beliefs, whilst theories from a “normal” rather than “abnormal” psychology have shown them to be intelligible rather than un-understandable. Yet the programme’s inherent limitations have meant that the potential of nonclinical research has not been fully realised. An alternative research programme is proposed which could elucidate the diversity of belief in the general population by examining the role of social norms and lived belief narratives in unconventional belief communities. This could address the limitations of the normalising programme, provide a necessary corrective to the “clinician’s illusi...
Research Interests:
Although histories of cognitive behaviour therapy have begun to appear, their use with people with psychosis diagnoses has received relatively little attention. In this article, we elucidate the conditions of possibility for the emergence... more
Although histories of cognitive behaviour therapy have begun to appear, their use with people with psychosis diagnoses has received relatively little attention. In this article, we elucidate the conditions of possibility for the emergence of cognitive behaviour therapy for psychosis (CBTp) in England between 1982 and 2002. We present an analysis of policy documents, research publications and books, participant observation, and interviews with a group of leading researchers and senior policy actors. Informed by Derksen and Beaulieu’s articulation of social technologies, we show how CBTp was developed and stabilised through the work of a variety of overlapping informal, academic, clinical, professional, and policy networks. The profession of clinical psychology played a key role in this development, successfully challenging the traditional ‘division of labour’ where psychologists focused on ‘neurosis’ and left ‘psychosis’ to psychiatry. Following Abbott's systems approach to profe...
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
How do mental health professionals link adverse life experiences with the kinds of beliefs and experiences which attract a diagnosis of psychosis and what implications does this have for women with these diagnoses? Drawing on a broadly... more
How do mental health professionals link adverse life experiences with the kinds of beliefs and experiences which attract a diagnosis of psychosis and what implications does this have for women with these diagnoses? Drawing on a broadly critical realist framework, we present data from two studies relevant to these questions. First, we analyse the discursive practices engaged in during a staff-only discussion of a female in-patient with a psychosis diagnosis who had been raped some years previously. Staff oriented to the irrationality and factuality of her ostensibly delusional statements about rape and pregnancy in the present and formulated adverse experience as a “stress factor” triggering a manic episode, thereby precluding alternative contextualising interpretations. In a second, interview-based, study, psychiatrists drew on a range of discursive resources which differentiated “psychosis” from other forms of distress, constructed trauma as a stressor which could trigger psychosis...
Research Interests:
The spaces that surveillance produces can be thought of as ambiguous, entailing elements that are ethereal yet material, geographical yet trans-geographical. Contemporary surveillance systems form numerous connections that involve... more
The spaces that surveillance produces can be thought of as ambiguous, entailing elements that are ethereal yet material, geographical yet trans-geographical. Contemporary surveillance systems form numerous connections that involve multiple times, spaces, and bodies. Owing to their ubiquity, normalization, and yet clandestine characteristics, they seem to produce an almost unnoticed aspect of everyday life. The impacts, then, of contemporary surveillance systems appear to be particularly experienced on the margins of consciousness. Thus we find that an empirical analysis of this realm of experience is possible but requires one to look for such things as disruption, disfluency, and hesitation in the text of speech acts rather than clear representation. Through empirical analysis of narratives concerning everyday experiences of living with contemporary surveillance systems, this paper focuses on their possible affective impacts. In turn, we find it more fitting to think about the so-ca...
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
In this article I discuss dilemmas which arise as psychologists and service users work more closely together, in particular when the clinical psychology profession presupposes that its interests and those of service users are synonymous... more
In this article I discuss dilemmas which arise as psychologists and service users work more closely together, in particular when the clinical psychology profession presupposes that its interests and those of service users are synonymous when they may not be.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Although histories of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy have begun to appear, their use with people with psychosis diagnoses has received relatively little attention. In this article we elucidate the conditions of possibility for the emergence... more
Although histories of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy have begun to appear, their use with people with psychosis diagnoses has received relatively little attention. In this article we elucidate the conditions of possibility for the emergence of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for Psychosis (CBTp) in England between 1982-2002. We present an analysis of policy documents, research publications and books, participant observation and interviews with a group of leading researchers and senior policy actors. Informed by Derksen and Beaulieu’s (2011) articulation of social technologies, we show how CBTp was developed and stabilised through the work of a variety of overlapping informal, academic, clinical, professional and policy networks. The profession of clinical psychology played a key role in this development, successfully challenging the traditional ‘division of labour’ where psychologists focused on ‘neurosis’ and left ‘psychosis’ to psychiatry. Following Abbott’s (1988) systems approach to professions, we identify a number of historical factors which created a jurisdictional vulnerability for psychiatry whilst strengthening the jurisdictional legitimacy of clinical psychology in providing psychological therapies to service users with psychosis diagnoses. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) played a significant role in adjudicating jurisdictional legitimacy and its 2002 schizophrenia guidelines, recommending the use of psychological therapies, marked a radical departure from the psychiatric consensus. Our analysis may be of wider interest in its focus on social technologies in a context of jurisdictional contestation. We discuss the implications of our study for the field of mental health and for the relationship between clinical psychology and psychiatry.
Over recent decades a research programme involving non-clinical samples has provided a justification for the use of normalising practices within Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for Psychosis. These studies have found that, contrary to... more
Over recent decades a research programme involving non-clinical samples has provided a justification for the use of normalising practices within Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for Psychosis. These studies have found that, contrary to mainstream psychiatric assumptions, beliefs considered delusional are neither rare in the general population nor qualitatively different from “non-delusional” beliefs whilst theories from a “normal” rather than “abnormal” psychology have shown them to be intelligible rather than un-understandable. Yet the programme’s inherent limitations have meant that the potential of non-clinical research has not been fully realised. An alternative research programme is proposed which could elucidate the diversity of belief in the general population by examining the role of social norms and lived belief narratives in unconventional belief communities. This could address the limitations of the normalising programme, provide a necessary corrective to the “clinician’s illusion” bias and prompt a more fundamental reconceptualization of beliefs considered delusional.
Research Interests:
Little is known about ordinary people’s understandings of conspiracy beliefs and how these understandings relate to the perspectives of researchers and scholars. Working within a social constructionist epistemological framework, we... more
Little is known about ordinary people’s understandings of conspiracy beliefs and how these understandings relate to the perspectives of researchers and scholars. Working within a social constructionist epistemological framework, we conducted a Q-methodology study aiming to identify a range of lay perspectives on two key topics: the defining features of conspiracy beliefs; and aspects considered important in judging their plausibility. Fifty-six people (32 men and 24 women), recruited via regional UK Facebook groups, sorted their agreement with a set of statements on each of the two topics. A principal component analysis, followed by varimax rotation, was performed on each data set. Five accounts about the defining features of conspiracy beliefs were identified: that they are false, illogical and harmful; that they are forms of political critique; that there are varied types; that they are entertaining but ineffectual; and that they are held by a self-reinforcing minority. Four accounts about their evaluation were identified: conventional realist criteria; the importance of personal judgement; skeptical realism; and the assessment of critical thinking. The findings are discussed in the context of the literature and limitations of the study are considered. Implications for research and educational and policy interventions are outlined.
Research Interests:
How do mental health professionals link adverse life experiences with the kinds of beliefs and experiences which attract a diagnosis of psychosis and what implications does this have for women with these diagnoses? Drawing on a broadly... more
How do mental health professionals link adverse life experiences with the kinds of beliefs and experiences which attract a diagnosis of psychosis and what implications does this have for women with these diagnoses? Drawing on a broadly critical realist framework, we present data from two studies relevant to these questions. First, we analyse the discursive practices engaged in during a staff-only discussion of a female in-patient with a psychosis diagnosis who had been raped some years previously. Staff oriented to the irrationality and factuality of her ostensibly delusional statements about rape and pregnancy in the present and formulated adverse experience as a 'stress factor' triggering a manic episode, thereby precluding alternative contextualising interpretations. In a second, interview-based, study, psychiatrists drew on a range of discursive resources which differentiated psychosis from other forms of distress, constructed trauma as a stressor which could trigger psychosis because of a genetic predisposition, and constructed medication as the primary intervention whilst a focus on trauma was de-emphasised. We discuss the implications of these findings for the kinds of explanations and forms of help offered and suggest ways in which distress might be contextualised as well as possible future directions for feminist research and practice.
This article describes how the narrative construct is used in the Power Threat Meaning Framework to refer to personal narratives, cultural narratives and as a meta-theoretical language, synthesizing a range of different theoretical... more
This article describes how the narrative construct is used in the Power Threat Meaning Framework to refer to personal narratives, cultural narratives and as a meta-theoretical language, synthesizing a range of different theoretical perspectives. It identifies ways in which this approach to narrative may differ from its use in a number of therapeutic traditions. Focusing on medicalization and drawing on the concepts of ideological power, framing, filtering and gatekeeping, it discusses the processes which facilitate the dominance of a medical frame in the public conversation about mental health, proposing that such dominance is an example of hermeneutical injustice. The article concludes, firstly, by suggesting some practices which therapists and other professionals could use to broaden and contextualize therapy conversations and, secondly, by making some proposals for how the public conversation about mental health could be re-balanced.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Pilgrim focuses on three themes, beginning with the National Health Service (NHS). British clinical psychology has seen dramatic changes in recent years. For one thing increased public funding since the 1990s means that training numbers... more
Pilgrim focuses on three themes, beginning with the National Health Service (NHS). British clinical psychology has seen dramatic changes in recent years. For one thing increased public funding since the 1990s means that training numbers are now four times what they were in 1980. ...
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
This chapter begins by noting that the majority of the research reviewed originates from the Global North and that it tends to adopt an implicitly biomedical framework, to utilise psychiatric diagnostic categories in an uncritical manner... more
This chapter begins by noting that the majority of the research reviewed originates from the Global North and that it tends to adopt an implicitly biomedical framework, to utilise psychiatric diagnostic categories in an uncritical manner and draws heavily on stigma-based conceptualisations. The extent of mental health discrimination against those with psychiatric diagnoses is discussed including research on public attitudes. A number of causal factors are reviewed, including the role of the media. However, it is argued that biomedically-oriented and stigma-based conceptualisations are problematic and that a perspective focused on epistemic injustice is preferable. Extracts from a qualitative study based on interviews with mental health service users are presented, illustrating how people with psychiatric diagnoses respond to prejudice and discrimination and the varied strategies they use to manage it. Interventions to counter prejudice and discrimination are reviewed with a focus on their underlying conceptual assumptions (e.g. comparing biomedically-oriented and psychosocially-oriented approaches). The chapter ends with a discussion of potential future avenues for research and practice.
Research Interests:
Chapter to appear in: N. Moller, A. Vossler, D. Jones & D. Kaposi (eds) (in press), Understanding mental health and counselling. Milton Keynes: Open University Press.
The Power Threat Meaning Framework (PTMF), published by the British Psychological Society (BPS) in 2018, is an attempt to address the question of how we might understand what Harry Stack Sullivan called ‘problems in living’ other than by... more
The Power Threat Meaning Framework (PTMF), published by the British Psychological Society (BPS) in 2018, is an attempt to address the question of how we might understand what Harry Stack Sullivan called ‘problems in living’ other than by using psychiatric diagnostic systems. How might we best conceptualize emotional distress and behaviour which might concern or trouble others? We describe the context within which the PTMF was developed and explain some of its key elements before giving an overview of the articles in this special issue.