Majnūn or Mental Disorders: Between Cultural Traditions and Western Psychology in Jordan.

Publisher: Kluwer Academic Country of Publication: Netherlands NLM ID: 7707467 Publication Model: Print-Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1573-076X (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 0165005X NLM ISO Abbreviation: Cult Med Psychiatry Subsets: MEDLINE

Publication: Dordrecht : Kluwer Academic
Original Publication: Dordrecht, Boston, Reidel.

Islam*/psychology ; Mental Disorders*/ethnology ; Religion and Psychology*; Humans ; Jordan/ethnology ; Female ; Male ; Adult ; Middle Aged ; Young Adult ; Qualitative Research ; Arabs/psychology

Mental disorders or altered psychological states are prevalent in all populations, regardless of race or ethnic origin, while at the same time, culture also shapes the conceptions of mental disorders. Religion is deeply rooted in the daily life of the Muslim-majority countries, while Arab countries are affected by an ongoing modernization. Thus, how does the traditional religious conception of mental disorders interact with Western psychological conceptions in contemporary Arab-Muslim society? This study explores the conceptions of mental disorders and their causes among Muslims in contemporary Jordan. By employing cognitive anthropological method (free listing), forty participants were asked to provide three lists of (a) typical names of mental disorders, (b) causes of mental disorders and (c) determining features of mental disorders. Collected qualitative data have been quantitatively analysed and interpreted in the context of relevant ethnographic and interview data. While Western terms of mental disorders are well known among young and educated Jordanians, the study demonstrates that Jordanians employ cultural and religious notions alongside. This co-existence of different conceptions confirms an importance of Islamic notion in the modern rendering of mental health. As a result, despite rapid modernization, mental health is still highly stigmatized.
(© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.)

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Keywords: Cognitive anthropology; Culture; Jordan; Mental disorders; Religion

Date Created: 20220810 Date Completed: 20240423 Latest Revision: 20240423

20240424

10.1007/s11013-022-09787-0

35948861