Rosenhan Experiment
The Rosenhan experiment was a 1973 study in which eight healthy individuals faked hallucinations to gain admission to psychiatric hospitals, where they then acted normally. All were diagnosed with psychiatric disorders and admitted, and staff failed to detect their sanity. The study exposed serious flaws in psychiatric diagnosis and labeling.
Background
The Rosenhan experiment was a landmark 1973 study in which psychologist David Rosenhan and seven healthy accomplices faked auditory hallucinations to gain admission to psychiatric hospitals. Once inside, they behaved normally, yet staff interpreted nearly all their ordinary actions — note-taking, pacing, waiting — as symptoms of mental illness. They were kept hospitalized for 7–52 days and all were discharged with a diagnosis of "schizophrenia in remission," suggesting that psychiatric labels are so powerful they override actual behavior. The study is a foundational critique of the validity of psychiatric diagnosis and launched decades of debate about the reliability of the DSM, the standard manual of mental disorders.