Education and Early Years
Spitzer was born in White Plains, New York in 1932. He received his bachelor's degree in psychology from Cornell University and his M.D. from New York University School of Medicine in 1957. Spitzer wrote an article on Wilhelm Reich's theories in 1953 which the American Journal of Psychiatry declined to publish.
Spitzer served on the four-person United States Steering Committee for the United States–United Kingdom Diagnostic Project, who published their results in 1972. (The most important difference between countries they found was that the concept of schizophrenia used in New York was much broader than the one used in London and included patients who would have been termed manic-depressive or bipolar.) Spitzer co-developed a computer program, Diagno I, in 1968, based on a logical decision tree, that could derive a diagnosis from the scores on a Psychiatric Status Schedule (which he co-published in 1970) and that the Project used to check the consistency of its results.
Spitzer codeveloped the Mood Disorder Questionnaire (MDQ), a screening technique used for diagnosing bipolar disorder. He also codeveloped the Patient Health Questionnaire (PRIME-MD) which can be self-administered to find out if one has a mental illness.
Read more about this topic: Robert Spitzer (psychiatrist)
Famous quotes containing the words early years, education, early and/or years:
“Even today . . . experts, usually male, tell women how to be mothers and warn them that they should not have children if they have any intention of leaving their side in their early years. . . . Children don’t need parents’ full-time attendance or attention at any stage of their development. Many people will help take care of their needs, depending on who their parents are and how they chose to fulfill their roles.”
—Stella Chess (20th century)
“... education fails in so far as it does not stir in students a sharp awareness of their obligations to society and furnish at least a few guideposts pointing toward the implementation of these obligations.”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)
“No two men see the world exactly alike, and different temperaments will apply in different ways a principle that they both acknowledge. The same man will, indeed, often see and judge the same things differently on different occasions: early convictions must give way to more mature ones. Nevertheless, may not the opinions that a man holds and expresses withstand all trials, if he only remains true to himself and others?”
—Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749–1832)
“One of the most difficult aspects of being a parent during the middle years is feeling powerless to protect our children from hurt. However “growthful” it may be for them to experience failure, disappointment and rejection, it is nearly impossible to maintain an intellectual perspective when our sobbing child or rageful child comes in to us for help. . . . We can’t turn the hurt around by kissing the sore spot to make it better. We are no longer the all-powerful parent.”
—Ruth Davidson Bell (20th century)