New Prize for Excellence in Mental Health Media to Spur a Public Forum in Stockbridge.

4.23.2010

March 15 2010 – The Erik H. Erikson Institute for Education and Research at the Austen Riggs Center has announced a new prize for excellence in mental health media. In this inaugural year, the Institute will honor three esteemed journalists who have brought nuance, compassion, and scientific rigor to their coverage of mental illness and recovery.

The inaugural award winners are Alix Spiegel of NPR; Erica Goode of The New York Times; and Richard Simon of The Psychotherapy Networker.

“The Erikson Institute Prize for Excellence in Mental Health Media recognizes major contributions to public understanding of mental health issues, primarily in the print, online press and broadcast media,” says Dr. M. Gerard Fromm, the Evelyn Stefansson Nef Director of the Institute. Major contributions in film, literature, and the arts may also be recognized, Fromm adds.

According to the prize guidelines, its purpose is “to reward and encourage sophisticated, accessible work on mental illness and recovery, and to stimulate conversation about the broad range of mental health issues, including how to dispel stigma and promote well-being.”

Every year, the Erikson Prize will recognize three individuals with an award of $1,500 each. Prize-winners will be honored in a forum on mental health media at the Austen Riggs Center in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. The 2010 forum, which is open to the public, will take place from 1:30-4:30pm, Saturday, June 12.  The fee for the event is $15, and early registration is recommended. 

 “For writers and editors, there’s no topic more challenging than mental health,” says Joshua Wolf Shenk, the author of Lincoln’s Melancholy: How Depression Challenged a President and Fueled His Greatness, and member of the jury for the inaugural prize. “And the community of patients, mental health professionals, and researchers knows how vital it is that journalists get things right.” The prize, Shenk says, will help bring attention to standard-setting work on mental health issues, and spur conversation between the media and authorities in the field they cover.

 “We wanted to use this as an opportunity to offer the mental health community an opportunity to learn about how journalists think about these issues — and to create an open conversation about the way that clinical perspectives can be brought accurately and helpfully to public discussion,” says Fromm.

That mission - of education and outreach –is the core of the Erikson Institute, which attempts to bring learning from the Riggs clinical program into broader conversation with mental health professionals and the public at large.  The Erikson Institute takes its name from Erik H. Erikson, the renowned humanist psychoanalyst and former Riggs staff member, whose work explored the connection between individuals and their psychosocial and historical contexts.

“For our work to make a difference in people’s lives,” says Dr. Edward Shapiro, the hospital’s medical director/CEO, “Riggs, too, must develop its connections to the larger society.” The Erikson Institute does this, Shapiro says, by promoting education and research in psychodynamic thought and treatment, by generating interdisciplinary scholarship, and by applying clinical learning to the problems of the larger society.”

The inaugural winners have years of experience creating evocative pieces on mental health for three major national media outlets. Alix Spiegel, a reporter with the National Desk at NPR, has reported on everything from the mental health consequences of Hurricane Katrina to psychotherapeutic approaches to transgender children. A graduate of Oberlin College, Spiegel was a founding producer of the public radio show This American Life. She has also written for The New Yorker magazine and The New York Times.

Erica Goode came to The New York Times in 1998 as the human behavior writer for the Science Department. In 2003, she became the health editor for Science Times and today she directs the Times’ environmental coverage.A graduate of the University of Michigan, Goode received a masters of science degree in social psychology from the University of California, Santa Cruz. Goode has also written and edited for U.S. News and World report and the San Francisco Chronicle.  Most recently, her poignant account of suicides among returning Iraq War soldiers illuminated the many dimensions of this growing tragedy.

Richard Simon is the editor of the Psychotherapy Networker, a National Magazine Award winning journal. The magazine covers everyday challenges of clinical practice, while also offering perspective on the social issues, critical ideas, and therapeutic innovations shaping the direction of psychotherapy. The Chicago Tribune has called the Networker one of the 50 Best Magazines in America.

Established in 1919, the Austen Riggs Center provides psychiatric treatment in a voluntary, open, and non-coercive community. Named one of America's best hospitals by U.S. News & World Report, Riggs is renowned for its work with patients previously regarded as “treatment resistant.”The treatment includes intensive psychodynamic psychotherapy in a therapeutic community, state of the art psychopharmacology, family and group treatment and a vibrant activities progam, all within a series of step-down programs and continuity of care with a multidisciplinary team.

The Austen Riggs Center is located at 25 Main Street, Stockbridge, Massachusetts.  Individuals interested in attending the Media Colloquy can call (413) 931-5236 to register, or register online.