Growing Number Of Students Ask Psychiatric Care

The number of Radcliffe students, of Harvard undergraduates, and graduate students receiving psychiatric help from the Health Services has been growing by 100 to 200 each year, Dr. Dana L. Farnsworth, UHS director, said yesterday.

According to Farnsworth, nine per cent of Harvard undergraduates and 14 per cent of Radcliffe students are now receiving psychiatric care at the UHS.

He the increase to growing student willingness to seek such assistance, and to the enlarged UHS psychiatric staff.

Psychiatrist is Teacher

The increase, Farnsworth said, is also that preventive psychiatry is becoming accepted as an integral part of college education. The college psychiatrist is simply a "teacher whose special duty it is to aid in the emotional aspects of maturation," he explained.

Farnsworth rejected the belief that intelligence increases the likelihood of emotional problems. Recent studies have shown that "high intellectual capacity is accompanied by a high degree of emotional stability," he said.

Applicants to Harvard who have had psychiatric treatment are never rejected on that basis, Farnsworth noted.

A book by Farnsworth on the role of psychiatry in education, "Psychiatry, Education and the Young Adult," is scheduled for publication within the next two months.