Crazy like Us: Countries and Dissimilar Cultural Understandings

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Crazy like Us Reaction Paper
I was surprised and intrigued by the author’s main thesis of chapter 4: different countries have dissimilar cultural understandings of what symptoms classify as depressive or anxiety disorder. Japan’s cultural perception of depression over the years was fascinating because I did not imagine that their expressions of anxiety and depression were as deep-seated and different from those of Western countries to impede any market entrance of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). The idea that cultural understandings of depression and anxiety can influence help-seeking behaviors in a country to such an extent as to make pharmacological treatment relatively extraneous demonstrated the powerful influence of cultural values on mental health. GlaxoSmithKline brain trust realized that the only way to make Western medicine acceptable to a culture that did not understand depression and anxiety in the way Westerners was first to understand how Japanese culture influenced the illness experience. While SSRIs had been in the market for over a decade, the Japanese people were hesitant to accept the drugs because they did not even want to accept the disease. The country’s vitally different understanding of depression influenced their decision to ignore pharmacological treatment. The case study of Japan helped me grasp the importance of first understanding a country’s culture and perceptions of a disorder before implementing a one-size-fits-all notion of the illness.
I was also fascinated by the slow reception of Western medicine in Japan. Unlike Western countries that were quick to embrace science i...