Women and the Ownership of PMS: The Structuring of a Psychiatric Disorder (Social Institutions and Social Change) (PDF)

Who “owns” Premenstrual Syndrome (PMS)? Is it a mental illness? In 1986, after a year of bitter dispute, the Board of Trustees of the American Psychiatric Association voted to place a premenstrually related diagnosis in an appendix of the revised edition of its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-III-R).In her book, Figert explains why the decision was controversial and consequential in three domains in which people, their interests, and claims to ownership coincide: the Health and Mental Health Domain, the Woman Domain, and the Science Domain, each constituted by various players in the controversy. Among those with a stake in the outcome were health care professionals, feminists, women with a history of PMS, journalists, and gynecological researchers.

Figert concludes by showing how and why the controversy over partial inclusion continued. The AP A would go on to change its description of the depressive disorder and include it in the main text of the manual in 1994, although the criteria remain in an appendix and the phenomena described are multiple and distinctive. New actors, changing interests, and old arguments are presented in documenting the latest installment in the PMS/DSM drama.

Although sociology has come late to the controversy, a much more complicated picture of PMS emerges from taking the approach that there are no “right” or “wrong” sides in this controversy. Instead, there are merely complicated issues, scientific and political stances, and people from anonymous women with PMS to the scientists and mental health professionals to anti-inclusion protestors. This book is about all of the people, events, and issues involved.