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The Ubiquity of Substance Abuse in the Calculus of Crime and Mental Illness

By Kent Scheidegger et al.

As mentioned previously, the recent National Institute of Mental Health's CATIE study suggested a link between schizophrenia and violence. That conclusion generated a lot of controversy from folks who assert that there is no link between mental illness and violence, touting the frequent mantra that those with mental illness are no more likely to become violent than the general population. Indeed, we should be careful not to needlessly contribute to the enduring stigma that burdens those with mental illness. Nonetheless, we shouldn't ignore the link between mental illness and crime simply because it makes some people uncomfortable or is at odds with the vested rhetoric of political correctness. Several recent studies in the journal Psychiatric Services shed some new light on the subject and are worth a few comments...continue to full post

Full post as published by Crime and Consequences on February 06, 2008 (boomark / email).