Hysteria to Healing

A Brief History of Psychology, Psychiatry, Gender, and the Military’s Role in Shaping Modern Mental Health

The story of mental health reaches back nearly 4,000 years. As early as ~1900 BCE, ancient Egyptian texts describe conditions recognizable today as psychological or emotional disturbances.

By ancient Greece, physicians and philosophers including followers of Hippocrates attempted to explain emotional suffering. Their theories were profoundly gendered. Women’s symptoms were attributed to a “wandering womb,” or hystera, giving rise to the term hysteria. Anxiety, anger, sadness, unexplained physical complaints, and “nervousness” were believed to result from reproductive organs and moral weakness rather than trauma or social oppression.

For centuries, women’s emotional and physical experiences were pathologized in ways that mirrored societal gender norms.

Early Modern Period (1600s–1700s): New Theories, Same Biases

By the 17th–18th centuries, some physicians challenged womb-based theories, proposing neurological or emotional origins for distress. Yet the gender bias persisted, and the overwhelming majority of people labeled “mentally ill” were still women.

At the same time, reforms emerged. Philippe Pinel in France advocated for humane treatment over confinement, helping shift public perceptions though treatment remained far from equitable.

Women as the Foundation of Early Psychology and Psychiatry

Historically, women were the primary subjects of psychological study, the majority of patients in asylums, and the group most readily labeled with disorders like hysteria, neurasthenia, or “nervousness.” Their emotions, social frustrations, trauma, and oppression were interpreted as personal pathology.

When psychology began to formalize as a profession in the late 1800s and early 1900s:

• Women were overrepresented as patients,

• Often excluded as researchers or theorists,

• Yet later became early adopters of emerging roles such as counselors, social workers, and mental-health practitioners.

This dynamic has persisted. Today, the majority of therapy clients are women, a reflection of both cultural norms (women being socialized toward emotional expression and help-seeking) and ongoing gender-related stressors, trauma exposure, and caregiving burdens.

At the same time, the psychology and psychiatry professions themselves have become increasingly female, especially in counseling, social work, and therapy though key leadership roles historically remained male-dominated.

Late 1800s: Scientific Psychology Emerges & Hysteria Is Reframed

Modern psychology took shape with the rise of experimental research:

• 1879: Wilhelm Wundt opens the first psychology laboratory (Germany).

• 1883: First U.S. psychology lab opens at Johns Hopkins.

Research expands into memory, learning, cognition, and behavior, moving psychology away from superstition and philosophy.

Simultaneously, “hysteria” remained a common deeply gendered diagnosis. Physicians like Jean-Martin Charcotexamined hysteria as a neurological or psychological phenomenon.

Talk therapy also emerged. Sigmund Freud and Josef Breuer published Studies on Hysteria (1895), reframing symptoms like paralysis or seizures as expressions of psychological trauma rather than physical disease.

Problematic Treatments and Cultural Control

From the late 19th to early 20th century, women diagnosed with hysteria were subjected to a range of “treatments”:

• Marriage or pregnancy as a cure

• Sexual intercourse prescribed as therapy

• Oils, scents, fumigation of the womb

• Institutionalization

• (According to Rachel Maines) genital stimulation to induce “hysterical paroxysm”

These practices reflected how women’s pain, anger, trauma, and nonconformity were interpreted as illness requiring correction.

Freud, Trauma, and the Suppression of Women’s Stories

In 1896, Freud proposed that many cases of hysteria stemmed from sexual abuse, including childhood assault an astonishingly progressive claim. But under professional and social pressure, he later abandoned this “seduction theory,” shifting toward explanations involving unconscious fantasies rather than real experiences.

This retreat has had long-term consequences for how trauma especially in women and children—was dismissed or pathologized rather than believed.

The Military’s Enormous Influence on Modern Psychology

A major turning point in the development of modern psychology and psychiatry came not from universities, but from the military.

World War I

• Psychologists developed the first mass mental ability tests (Army Alpha & Beta) to sort millions of soldiers.

• This launched the fields of psychological testing, intelligence measurement, and personnel selection.

World War II

• Combat trauma (“shell shock,” later PTSD) forced psychiatry to confront the psychological effects of war.

• The military trained thousands of clinicians, accelerating the growth of clinical psychology.

• Veterans returning home generated unprecedented demand for therapy, leading to the expansion of counseling, social work, and psychiatry programs nationwide.

Cold War & Beyond

• Behavioral science, brain research, interrogation tactics, resilience training, and stress research were all heavily funded or influenced by military goals.

• Military investment shaped modern research methods, diagnostic categories, and the expansion of psychopharmacology.

In short, without the military, modern psychology and psychiatry as we know them testing, diagnostics, trauma research, clinical protocols would look radically different.

20th Century: Standardization and Evolution

1952: The first DSM was released, standardizing diagnoses.
Psychology grew into specialized subfields:

• Behaviorism

• Cognitive psychology

• Humanistic psychology

• Clinical and counseling psychology

• Neuropsychology

“Hysteria” gradually disappeared from the literature, replaced by terms like conversion disorder and somatic symptom disorder—attempts to reframe old diagnoses without the overt misogyny.

Modern Mental Health: Trauma-Informed, Integrative, and Aware of Systemic Bias

Today’s mental-health practice integrates:

• Neuroscience

• Trauma-informed care

• Holistic and mind-body methods

• Cultural and gender awareness

• Ethical, client-centered models

• Recognition of how social oppression shapes psychological distress

Importantly:

• Women remain the majority of therapy clients,

• Trauma is now understood as a central driver of mental-health symptoms,

• And there is a growing commitment to addressing the historical misuse of psychiatric labels to control or silence marginalized groups.

For Modern practitioners —rooted in holistic, integrative, client-centered care—this history underscores exactly why modern therapy must honor autonomy, agency, and lived experience rather than replicate the control-based systems of the past.