Den psykiatriska vården i artonhundratalets Sverige : i förvarande eller rehabiliterande syfte?

Sammanfattning: This qualitative study aims to gain knowledge and understanding of what it meant to be mentally ill in Sweden during the nineteenth century. Initially the study aims to grasp what psychiatry viewed as abnormal behaviour or emotions. These traits were defining what was considered to be mental illness. The definitions will henceforth be put in correlation to the psychiatric methods of treatment in a comparative method. Were these treatments made with rehabilitating intention? Or were the treatments instead made with the purpose of keeping the ill in custody? Interpretations of these options could in conclusion provide us with an impact of how the psychiatric care with its definitions and treatments reflected society’s progress and its standards. The analysis of theories and primary sources show the power of society as mostly negatively shaped towards the mentally ill. In the greatest allusion, psychiatric care in nineteenth-century Sweden was designed to keep the ill in custody.