ABSTRACT
This shift toward somaticism was marked by the publication of the third edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) of the APA in 1980 and the fourth in 1994. In these editions, the DSM shifted its emphasis from psychological to biological explanations (Kirk and Krutchins, 1992: 7), the
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) declaring, in the late 1990s, that “Study after study suggest[s] biochemical and genetic links to depression” (Nordenberg, 1998: n.p.). Continuing psychiatry’s expansionary and scientific quest, DSM III and IV also specified and elaborated in ever-growing detail the symptomatology of an ever-growing number of mental disorders.The Rebirth of Electroshock, 1981-1999
The return of somaticism fostered both pharmacology and ECT, while the limits of pharmacology facilitated the turn to ECT. From the 1950s to the 1970s drugs in general, and particularly new drugs, had captured the public imagination as “magic bullets” that would finally conquer mental illness. One of these substances, Prozac, became so widely prescribed and disseminated throughout the inpatient and outpatient population that America was labeled the Prozac Nation (Wurtzel, 1994). Each of the new drugs after its first “honeymoon” period caused problems, including the effects that medicine calls “side.” These ranged from discomforts such as weight gain, dry mouth, or sleep disturbance-associated with antidepressants such as Elavil-to the Parkinson’s-like tardive dyskinesia sometimes caused by neuroleptics or major tranquilizers (Klein and Wender, 1995: 132-133). Far from a “magic bullet” preventing depression and suicide, some psychiatric and media depictions of Prozac asserted that the drug caused suicide (Breggin, 1995: 150-151).
