Susannah Cahalan

Susannah Cahalan reexamines a celebrated psychology experiment in The Great Pretender, published by Grand Central Publishing in 2019. The book investigates David Rosenhan’s 1973 pseudopatient study, which reported that healthy volunteers gained admission to psychiatric hospitals and influenced debates about diagnosis and institutional care. Cahalan reviews archives, interviews participants and associates, and tests the surviving record against Rosenhan’s published account, raising questions without treating every uncertainty as settled fact. The journalist, who also wrote Brain on Fire, brings personal familiarity with diagnostic error to this work of medical history and investigative reporting. The Great Pretender was shortlisted for the 2020 Royal Society Science Book Prize.