Improving mental hygiene

Living conditions, social activities and the inculcation of the individual's attitudes towards himself and towards society have a definite impact on the his ability to participate in society to his full potential.

1. Programmes which purport to improve the individual's social attitudes necessarily promote their own vision of what society and the individual should be, with differing levels of coercion. 2. "Mental health" is understood in the terms of the society in which it originates, and has no reliably universal norms. Thus, its promotion most often entails conforming with society's status quo.