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Healing experiences of people : an exploratory study
Author
Ravi Natvarlal Patel
Supervisor
Lee, Boon Ooi
Abstract
Psychiatric disorders are prevalent in today's world, and people with mental disorders seek help from various sources including psychiatrists, psychologists, counsellors and spiritual healers. This study aims to explore how these people with mental disorders make sense of different systems of help especially when the etiology of the mental disorder may differ greatly in each healing system. This study utilised Dow's (1986) symbolic healing model to understand the help seeking experiences of people with mental disorders. Semi-structured interviews were carried out with 7 clients. Sampling was purposive to capture a homogenous group. Interviews were audio-taped and transcribed and a thematic analysis carried out using interpretative phenomenological analysis. It was found that Dow's symbolic model of healing had some shortcomings and was only partly able to explain the findings. It was found that use of Explanatory Models allowed better mapping of the client's mythic world. It was also found that clients not necessarily had to have an EM match with the healer as Dow postulated, as clients can take on a pragmatic attitude to healing and ignore their own EMs. The importance of knowing the clients expectations of healing and how well these expectations were met was emphasised, as it was found to be closely linked to the clients definitions of healing and the clients therapeutic experience.
Date Issued
2012
Call Number
RC480 Pat
Date Submitted
2012