How have the views of abnormal behavior changed throughout history?

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and probably way before that as well, it was considered abnormal behavior for women to speak out or make a scene in public. Many women were extremely repressed, sexually and mentally; they were looked down upon if they made any sort of advances and those who could not get husbands (because their families were too poor to provide dowries, or not respectable enough), they usually had to live their lives out alone. Any affairs were considered scandalous and brought shame to the family. Some women who did decide to find release for their frustrations by lashing out or making a scene were actually diagnosed with a mental illness and sent to asylums. The Turn of the Screw is a very good Victorian era book told as a ghost story. However throughout the book the reader must question whether the main character, a governess, is really seeing ghosts or if she has just gone insane from being repressed all her life. This is a good example of how people saw abnormal behavior back then; superstition and the possibility of there actually being ghosts also plays a part. Fortunately nowadays we don't have to worry about being institutionalized just for freaking out once in a while.