A Study Of R.D. Laing's Existential Psychiatrical Thought

R.D.Laing is a famous British existential psychiatrist, and also an original thinker. He combined the philosophy of existentialism and thoughts of psychoanalysis, used the terms of existentialist philosophy to vividly portray the inner world of a schizophrenic and schizophic individuals, and make the process of schizophic intelligible. He also studied the families in which one member was diagnosed with schizophrenia, and elaborate the process of the development of schizophrenia. Since Laing refused to view mental illness in biomedical or clinical terms, he has often been labelled as part of the so-called 'antipsychiatry' movement. Laing's thought chanllenged traditional views of psychiatric treatment, evoked people to query those basic hypotheses that ruled their lives and thoughts, left his mark on psychiatric practice.This paper was divided into six groupings to comment laing's existential psychiatric works and new development. First covered are laing's life and the source of his thought. Freud's psychoanalytic theory, Sartre's existentialism and phenomenology, and the views of Winnicott, Martin Buber and Gregory Bateson provided the basis for Laing's thought. Second, Laing's main ideas were divided into four parts and explicated independently, included the view of existential psychiatry; the theory and method of interpersonal perception Laing developed, in association with Phillipson and Lee ; the work Laing and Esterson did on the family ; his view and practice on Psychotherapy. Third, introduce the new development of Laing's thoughts. Finally, Laing's works as a whole are briefly discussed and show its limits , strengths and influences.