Sociology

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Cultural Codes and Emotional Expression: The New Racism in Psychiatric Interviews
(2014) Howe, Nora; Gould, Mark
The tools used to make psychiatric diagnoses are unable to evaluate effectively the emotional expression of African American patients. The different histories and social positions of Caucasians and African Americans mean that the two groups have different cultural norms. Cultural norms, the learned and shared meanings that allow us to interact with others, regulate all facets of our behavior, including emotional expression. In this thesis, I analyze psychiatric transcripts of Caucasian and African American patients and find that the tools used for psychiatric diagnosis--the semistructured interview and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders--favor the emotional expressions consistent with Caucasian cultural norms. Further, the bias in the diagnostic tools creates the possibility that emotional expressions common to African Americans, such as anger and defensiveness, will be interpreted as psychosis. Psychiatric diagnosis and treatment of African Americans will remain ineffective and potentially harmful to patient wellness until psychiatric tools are restructured to account for the impact of cultural norms on emotional expression.