Mendel et. al. focused on the influence of confirmation bias in mental health professionals. Confirmation bias is when you are more prone to search for information that confirms your beliefs or hypothesis. 75 medical students and 75 psychiatrists were assigned a decision task and found that 3% of the psychiatrists and 25% of the students showed confirmation bias when they searched for new information. This was after they already made an initial diagnosis. A large number of participants showed that they were less likely to change their initial diagnosis after searching for information that confirmed their diagnosis, than those who searched for contradictory information that challenged their first diagnosis. As a result, the participants who indicated confirmation bias misdiagnosed 70% of their patients. This led to prescribing different treatments from the participants who diagnosed their patients correctly. In conclusion, confirmation bias can lead to wrongful decisions building upon each other. Researchers or psychiatrists, in this case, should be aware of the impact of confirmation bias and search for balanced information during the diagnostic process.
The study of Naeem et. al. examined whether cognitive behaviour therapy would be effective to treat depression in Pakistan due to the variety of presentations of symptoms across cultures, specifically how depressive disorder symptoms present themselves among Pakistanis. The researchers interviewed outpati
ents that were diagnosed with depression at a university teaching hospital in Pakistan. The purpose of the interview was to determine the extent of the patientÂ’s knowledge. Thus open-ended questions were asked about their general knowledge about mental illnesses, the health care system and their perceptions of the treatment they had been receiving. It resulted in the researchers noticing that the patients had very little to no knowledge about mental disorders or depression itself and were reluctant to discuss nonmedicinal treatments. This was possibly due to the difficulties of cross-cultural work, for the researchers stated that there were linguistic and interpretation issues. After an improved, second interview the researchers gathered that the Pakistani patients described their illness as a psychosocial problem that is caused by tension. Clinical bias in the form of cross-cultural variations of symptoms, for the patient has been treated with a universal treatment for their depressive disorder, namely cognitive behavioural therapy. This is not effective because of the cultural differences, therefore the treatment has been modified to fit the patients needs. In conclusion, the participants are more willing to accept medicinal treatments than therapy due to their perceptions of the illness. It is important for psychiatrists and doctors to know what the patientÂ’s knowledge and perception are of the illness before diagnosing them to avoid clinical biases.