By Emalee Gillis, NAMI Spokane Blog Editor.
In recognition of Women’s History Month, NAMI Spokane celebrates the following trailblazing women in the mental health field.
Dorot
hea Dix (1802 – 1887). In the early 1800’s, mentally ill people were hidden away by families or even locked up in jails or prisons. Dix saw how inhumanely these people were treated. She was one of the only people back then to assert that mental illness could be helped and even cured, contrary to the belief of many back then. Ultimately, she ended up playing a role in the development of over 30 psychiatric hospitals.
Mary Whiton Calkins (1863 – 1930) was an American philosopher and psychologist whose work informed theory and research of memory, dreams, and the self. In 1903, Calkins was the twelfth in a listing of fifty psychologists with the most merit chosen by her peers. Calkins was refused a Ph.D. by Harvard University because of her gender even though she had completed all requirements for her graduate degree.
Melanie Klein (1882 – 1960) played a pivotal role in developing play therapy, a technique commonly used to help children express their feelings and experiences in a natural and helpful way. Klein utilized play therapy to investigate children’s unconscious feelings, anxieties, and experiences.
Melanie Klein had a significant impact on developmental psychology which focuses on human growth throughout life.
Karen Horney (1885-1952) created the term “womb envy,” a concept in which men experience insecurity around not having the ability to bear children. Her female-centric stance on psychology, which was still a male dominated field at the time, was very influential. She was also notable for holding the belief that a person could take a personal role in improving their own mental health, something that’s a staple of psychological treatment today.
Leta Stetter Hollingworth (1886-1939) is known for her work with gifted children and intelligence, but some of her most influential work is on the equality of women.. She ran cognitive, perceptual, and motor tasks on both men and women and found no evidence to support the idea that women are inferior to men psychologically. Despite the sexism she faced and her tragically short life, her work was incredibly influential to the field of psychology.
Anna Freud (1895 – 1982), daughter of Sigmund, was a successful psychologist in her own right. She created the field of child psychoanalysis, and her work contributed greatly to our understanding of child psychology. She also developed different techniques to treat children. Freud noted that children’s symptoms differed from those of adults and were often related to developmental stages. She also built on her father’s work by providing clear explanations of the ego’s defense mechanisms.
Virginia Satir (1916-1988) Satir developed Transformational Systemic Therapy which focuses on the interactions and communication patterns within families. She believed that addressing dysfunctional communication and relationship dynamics could lead to positive change within the family system.
Satir experimented with techniques commonly used in practice today like role-playing, family sculpting, and guided communication. These techniques allow families to explore, acknowledge, and modify their own communication patterns in-session.
Mamie Phipps Clark (1917 – 1983) made many important contributions to psychology, including the development of the Clark Doll Test, her research on race, and her role in the famous 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education case. Clark became the first Black woman to earn a degree from Columbia University. Her research on racial identity and self-esteem helped pave the way for future research on self-concept among minorities.
Marsha Lineman (1943 – present) changed the treatment of borderline personality disorder (BPD) forever when she developed dialectical behavior therapy in the 1980s. DBT is a skills-based therapy approach teaching mindfulness, interpersonal effectiveness, emotional regulation, and distress tolerance to learn to better cope with BPD symptoms like suicidal thoughts and urges to self-harm. Although its main indication is for BPD, DBT is now used for a variety of other mental health concerns.
Kay Redfield Jamison (1946 – present) is a leading expert on bipolar disorder whose research and advocacy efforts have helped to reduce stigma surrounding mental illness and improve understanding of mood disorders. Her work has shed light on the lived experience of individuals with bipolar disorder and the creative potential associated with mood disorders. By sharing her personal story, she has helped to destigmatize mental illness and provide hope and inspiration to others facing similar challenges.
This article was generated with the help of AI and numerous historical sources.
Emalee Gillis is a writer and blog editor. She is the author of the memoir Adventures on the Path to Living Well with a Mental Illness and has a related TEDx Talk.