@article{605b35a70eeb4332a0f217b8b9a72201,
title = "Social class and chronicity of schizophrenia",
abstract = "Prior research and theory supported the hypothesis that social class status was inversely related to chronicity of schizophrenia. Chronicity was defined in terms of two components: duration of episodes and total number of episodes. A data file of hospital episodes of schizophrenia for a 7 yr period was developed from the Maryland Psychiatric Case Register to test the hypothesis. Social class status, as measured by occupation and education, was not systematically related to either duration of first hospitalization or to number of hospitalizations during the follow-up. It was suggested that changes in treatment practices, including the advent of psychotropic drugs and the community care movement, had reduced the relationship of social class to chronicity of schizophrenia.",
author = "Eaton, \{William W.\}",
note = "Funding Information: INTRODUCTION FOR MANY years sociologists and others have studied the effects of mental institutions on inmates [l-4]. A major focus of this concern has been the enforced dependency that inmate status entails, with resultant chronicity. Mental hospitals have been accused of being nothing more than custodial institutions, long-term {\textquoteleft}warehouses{\textquoteright} for deviant, but not necessarily sick, persons. These theories have been applied to schizophrenia, and it has been contended that many aspects of the mental institution tend to induce or reinforce the tendency for the schizophrenic to become chronic [3, 41. It is reasonable to expect that lower class individuals will be more easily {\textquoteleft}institutionalized{\textquoteright}. Lower class individuals have less power to resist or counteract {\textquoteleft}status degradation{\textquoteright} or the {\textquoteleft}betrayal funnel{\textquoteright} [5, 13. Living situations alternative to the mental hospital are not as attractive for lower class inmates as for upper class inmates. Lower class inmates are {\textquoteleft}relatively less deprived{\textquoteright} in the hospital setting [6]. Lower class families may be less willing to support a dependent person than upper class families [7]. Institutional depersonalization is more potent for the lower class individual, because he has fewer social and financial resources. Previous research has indicated that lower class schizophrenics are more likely to become chronic, {\textquoteleft}piling up{\textquoteright} in the hospitals to constitute a large proportion of the resident patients at any one time [8-131. However, one more recent study failed to observe a strong inverse relationship between social class and chronicity [14]. Thus, it seemed reasonable to test the hypothesis that lower class schizophrenics will be more likely to be chronic than upper class schizophrenics. {\textquoteleft}Chronic{\textquoteright} is defined as {\textquoteleft}ever present or recurring{\textquoteright}. Fortunately this dual definition is consonant with useful operational measures of chronicity. The {\textquoteleft}ever-present{\textquoteright} nature of a chronic behavior is measured by its duration, a simple interval measure of elapsed time since the inception of the behavior. The {\textquoteleft}recurrent{\textquoteright} nature of chronic behavior is measured by the number of times the behavior recurs following the first occurrence (again, an interval measure). Thus, the hypothesis above becomes two: (1) lower class individuals will have episodes of longer duration : (2) lower class individuals will have more recurrences. *This research was conducted while I was supported by NIMH grant No. MH07413. The Center for Demography and Ecology, supported by NICHHD grant No, I-POl-HD-05876, aided by giving programming assistance and computer facilities. TDepartment of Sociology, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec. 191",
year = "1975",
month = apr,
doi = "10.1016/0021-9681(75)90050-8",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "28",
pages = "191--198",
journal = "Journal of Chronic Diseases",
issn = "0021-9681",
publisher = "Pergamon Press Ltd.",
number = "4",
}