The Present Status Of The Theory Of Mental Health Service

Theory of Mental health service is a general principle and a group of general principles having relationship between each other which are generated on the base of the explanation of known facts and experience in mental health service. The theory of mental health is not just the result from practice in mental health service but also the principle which is used to guild the mental health service. A number of theories are included in contemporary mental health service, such as psychodynamic theory, cognitive theory, behavioral theory, humanistic theory and integrating theory. It is an important part of the construction of mental health service as its foundation and the mark of its maturation in development. About 500 kinds of theories have been developed in western mental health service over the past 100 years, and it has been through the process from generating a single theory to integrating multiple theories. It has been started to immigrate western theory of mental health service in China since 1980s, and indigenized theory and indigenous theory have been created during the process of its immigration and study. However, there hasn't systematical research has been run on the overall situation of mental health service in China. We are planning to aim at advancing the method to process Chinese mental health theory by figuring out the current situation of theory of mental health service in China, hoping make our own contribution to construct mental health service theory which could fit to current situation in China very well.The research is constructed by five parts:First research, the references which had been published in 11 kinds of psychological journals in China were collected and analyzed by bibliometrics, in order to take insight into the current situation of Chinese mental health service theory and the factor which has impact on the choice mental health practitioners made to choose mental health theory. Second research, the questionnaire survey was run on practitioners who are working on mental health teaching, psychological consult and psychological therapy in multiple institutions such as educational institution and social institution in China. The purpose in second research is figure out the current situation of the Chinese mental health service theory by studying on foreign theory, indigenized theory and indigenous theory, in the meantime the factor which has impact on choice mental health practitioner made on picking up the mental health theory in their therapy was also taken our concern. We choose three methods to take samples:first, handed out survey on national psychological therapy and consult conference; second, invited the psychologists to run local research in northeast of china, north china, east china, south-central china, southwest of china and northwest of china; third, collected relevant information in China by email, internet chatting and mental consult website. We got 2357 survey back after 10 months'research from July 2009 to May 2010.3. We took deep interview on 11 practitioners who have devoted in mental health service in hospital, educational institution and social mental consult institution in order to get more knowledge of current situation on Chinese mental health service theory and the factor which has power on mental health practitioners'choice on choosing mental theory to run their therapy.4. Our work on the typical indigenous theory took diantong therapeutics as an example of case study to look into the character of indigenous theory and the factor on its generation and development process.5. We gave the advice on developing mental health service theory in China based on the previous four researchesWe got several conclusions from the above five researches:1. The foreign theories are the main sources of the theory which is practiced by Chinese mental health servicer, and the most frequently used theories are western traditional theories, such as cognitive theory, psychoanalytic/psychodynamic theory, humanistic/existential theory and behavior theory.2. The imaging communication psychotherapy and cognitive and insight therapy which Chinese mental health servicer have been used as indigenized theory both have powerful influence on Chinese mental health service.3. The indigenous theories include principle theory and concrete theory. The principle theory is the Chinese traditional philosophy which guilds mental health service in China, such as Confucianism, Taoist theories and Buddhism. The Confucianism is the most popular theory used by mental health servicer in China. The concrete theory is the specific principle which was developed in practice, such as the Taoist cognitive therapy, Chinese medicine therapy, the dredging psychotherapy and diantong therapeutics. And the Chinese medicine therapy is the most frequently used therapy.4. The most frequently used method by Chinese mental health practitioners is integrating multiple theories (95.1%), and the chance using single theory in therapy is rare (4.9%). And then the cognitive theory is usually used in integrating theories.5. The degree of specialization mental health practitioners have decides what particular theory is chosen in their therapy. The higher degree of specialization (the degree of their education, the knowledge they have in psychology, medicine and on other expertise), the more they are willing to use integrating theories. Three factors, clients'situation, the effect of consult and expertise of practitioner, have impact on the choice of which theory is going to be chosen by practitioner.6. Diantong therapeutics is the typical case in Chinese native mental health service. Taoist theories, Confucianism and Luo study of traditional Chinese medicine are the principle theory for diantong therapeutics. It takes advantage from previous research, develops mental network theory and constructs several mental health methods, such as adjusting desire method, experiencing in person, eliciting truth with incisive sentences and shaping soul. From the studying on this case study, we are capable to get conclusion that the factor which has power on the generation and development of mental health service in China includes the external factor, such as the getting acceptance from other people, getting encouragement from friends, suffering the ignorance and attack from other people, and the internal factor, such as the pursuing the effect of the therapy, being interest in psychological knowledge, having sufficient knowledge, keeping mind open to handle censure, the skill of learning and ability of making wise judgment. The internal factors have more power on the generation and development of indigenous theory than external factor does.7. Because the theory which is used by mental health practitioner frequently is generated in western culture, Chinese practitioners should be careful when taking advantage from western experience on mental health treatment. The proper way to make use of western theory on mental health treatment is to make modification on those which are fitting to Chinese culture and abandon those which are not fitting to Chinese culture, and to construct indigenous theory by concerning Chinese culture and reality. Obviously using foreign theory without thinking whether it fits to Chinese culture is not recommended. In other side, Chinese mental health practitioners should be encouraged to create indigenous theory. When exploring indigenous mental health theory, Chinese practitioners should be willing to improve their own quality, to figure out the potential problem in Chinese mental health service, to contribute new idea on mental health service and prove its effect in practice by following these rules, having doubts when getting the knowledge from previous researches and books, taking the reality as research foundation, making communication and comparison with other researchers and other researches, making adjust on their own research.The innovativeness in the research on theory and method is below. We advanced the concept of mental health service theory, and sorted it into three types, foreign theory, indigenous theory and indigenized theory. We also made analysis on Chinese mental health service theory and figured out its current situation and the factor which has impact on the choice Chinese practitioner made to choose mental health theory in their practice. And then we took diantong therapeutics as an example of typical study to discuss the character of the indigenous mental health theory and the important factor in its generation and development. In the method innovativeness, we used multiple methods to run the systematical research from multiple views. We run the systematical research by focusing on the combined use of national sample and case study, the quantified study and qualitative study, and learning foreign experience based on native culture.Our research uncovered the fundamental situation of the theory which is used by mental health practitioner in China. In the future we are willing to make comparison on the practical effect among those different integrating theories, figure out how to indigenize the foreign theories. And we are going to work out how to construct mental health service theory which has Chinese character, and how to improve indigenous theory.