Users and non-users of a student psychiatric clinic.

Abstract

Studies of the clientele of psychiatric clinics have repeatedly shown that use is highly correlated with social variables such as social class. Since non-users are never studied, it is not clear whether these correlations occur because there is more illness in some social strata, or for other reasons. In the present study of users and non-users, it is found that the larger determinant of the correlation is not amount of illness, but religion and religious participation. This finding is interpreted to mean that there is a psychiatric public, whose members are oriented toward clinic-use with fewer symptoms fh.".n o-m.r.