Pioneering Women in Mental Health
March is Women’s History Month. The field of psychology has been shaped by the contributions of countless women, a few of whom are highlighted here:
Dorothea Dix (1802-1887)
Dorothea Dix was an early 19th-century activist and reformer who changed how the mentally ill are treated. The child of alcoholic parents and an abusive father, as a young woman, she experienced ill health (likely a major depressive episode). She was sent to Europe by her doctors to recuperate. There she was influenced by prominent reformers like Elizabeth Fry, who advocated for the British government’s direct, active role in social welfare. These reformers were investigating madhouses and asylums, recommending an overhaul of the system for caring for the mentally ill. Upon her return to America, she was inspired to expose the abusive and inhumane conditions of the mentally ill. Over her lifetime, she played a key role in the founding or expansion of over 30 hospitals for the treatment of the severely mentally ill on both sides of the Atlantic – speaking persuasively before legislators, leaders, and even the Pope. She argued fiercely against the notion that people experiencing mental illness could not be cured or helped.
Mamie Phipps Clark, Ph.D. (1917-1983)
Growing up Black in the Jim Crow South, Mamie Phipps Clark had lived experience with the injustice of racism and the damage segregation wrought. She became a social psychologist, and in her master’s thesis at Howard University, she studied how racial segregation affected African American school children’s self-image. This work fueled the famous doll studies she and her husband, fellow psychologist Kenneth Clark, became known for. Given a choice, kids growing up in segregated schools consistently chose white dolls over black dolls, even when they were asked “Give me the doll that looks like you.” The study demonstrated that “prejudice, discrimination and segregation” were harmful to children, causing them to view themselves as inferior.
She became the first Black woman to earn a doctorate from Columbia University in 1943, in the field of experimental psychology. The Clarks’ research became key evidence in the court challenge leading to the Supreme Court’s 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision.
Martha E. Bernal, Ph.D. (1931-2001)
Martha E. Bernal, Ph.D., the daughter of Mexican immigrants and the first Latina to earn a doctorate in psychology in America, was a clinical psychologist who made advancing multicultural psychology her life’s work. She overcame significant discrimination, including replies to job applications that read “We do not hire women.” She advocated for recruiting and training more minorities in the field, going on to help found the National Hispanic Psychological Association, and helped create structural change within the American Psychological Association.
Bebe Moore Campbell (1950-2006)
Bebe Moore Campbell was a best-selling author and educator who dedicated her life to advocating for the mental health needs of the Black community. She was a founding member of the Inglewood-LA chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Health (NAMI). Her work was fueled in part by a daughter living with mental illness. She poignantly wrote, “Once my loved ones accepted the diagnosis, healing began for the entire family, but it took too long. It took years. Can’t we, as a nation, begin to speed up that process? We need a national campaign to destigmatize mental illness, especially one targeted toward African Americans… It’s not shameful to have a mental illness. Get treatment. Recovery is possible.”
She died at age 56 of a brain tumor, but her legacy endures. Only two years after her passing, the U.S. House of Representatives declared July to be Bebe Moore Campbell National Minority Mental Health Awareness Month.