Comments on: 30 Psychobabble Phrases – Which Do You Hate Most?

By: hbv

hbv — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 15:30:34 +0000

My favorite psychobabble terms are CO-DEPENDENT, DENIAL, and PASSIVE-AGGRESSIVE. They can mean literally everything, describe literally everyone, and means absolutely nothing

By: neurogrrl

neurogrrl — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 20:15:00 +0000

I don't see the problem with saying someone's projecting- it seems to be an incredibly common dynamic these days as people jump to put the blame on others. In addition, NPD and OCD are *personality* diagnoses, which means they are clusters of rigid and maladaptive traits- easily observed by others, but not usually by oneself. I would generally prefer to say *narcissistic personality* rather than bringing disorder into it, but still the qualities are readily observable. I have had people jump all over me for saying I think someone is an introvert- what is wrong with this? Because I have not completed my professional education yet I am not qualified to make observations of someone's personality?
Finally, it is my impression that this blog itself feeds into shallow psychological thinking. Granted I have not examined it in-depth, but I don't see much rigor at first glance.

By: Lucia

Lucia — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 00:42:00 +0000

Fetishes don't have to be sexual.

By: Matty

Matty — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 20:58:00 +0000

I was so upset to see that a long comment I had written somehow was deleted when I posted it. But I read through some of the other comments and realized I didn't have to write it all over again! Doug Kyle pretty much just said it all for me. I have more respect for our language as well. Maybe the only example I thought was sort of valid was Schizophrenia because it's mostly misinformation out there that people form that paradigm out of. For the most part, I'd say there's no need to hate any psychobabble terms we find in colloquial speech.

By: Matty

Matty — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 20:50:00 +0000

Someone will always be offended one way or the other. The person who is "OCD" about cleaning their kitchen, for instance. You may say they lack respect for those who do suffer from it daily. I say you lack respect for the English language and the power we have to convey messages. Obviously this person is not convinced they have a disorder, but they are trying to convey how they can be meticulous with cleaning habits. And the OCD phrase conjures up an image. It gets the job done. I refuse to be P.C.'d to death. Some of the other items on this list fall in the same category. So what if Bipolar develops a second, more colloquial meaning... I know the difference, and so do you. What else do you ask? Can I not say I'm anxious about something if I don't look it up in the DSM-IV first? Relax, and "take a chill pill"... or can I say that?

By: Pablo

Pablo — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 01:33:00 +0000

I think the grief of a father passing is a little different than the grief of witnessing a classroom of students get sprayed.

On another note, I'm glad Stumbleupon introduced me to Doug Kyle.

By: maya857

maya857 — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 02:03:00 +0000

Teriffic post - I genuinely hope there is a part 2, 3 and 4 to this topic. As someone diagnosed with OCD, I don't get so annoyed when people misuse the term, as I think it's just a case of them not understanding the science, they may not even know it's a condition.

I get much more upset when people who know I have OCD are just "waiting" for me to wash my hands over and over. I don't do that, people don't seem to understand that mental illness is not a cookie cutter situation, and what they see on TV is not real!

Now a confession: I worked at an animal shelter, and I spent years trying to find out what was wrong with these people who came in, surrendering their animals and acting so incredibly immature and nasty. For example, people threatening to throw their cat in front of a car if they had to sign a form.

Finally, a coworker said she thought that most of them probably had borderline personality disorder. Quite frankly, I was so releived to have an explaination that I clung to it for years. I don't know if I can disentangle myself from this idea now even if I wanted to.

By: Jaliya

Jaliya — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 07:10:00 +0000

I only found this post this evening ... but must add two bits of balderdash that drive me bonkers (or is that...psychotic?! ;-D )

1. "It's all in your mind."

2. Affirmations like "Every day, in every way, I'm getting better and better!"

Oh! Another one -- It seems, that when a therapist and a client are in some kind of conflict or disagreement (especially if the therapist is pontificating on some esoteric psychobabble) ... if there's any strong emotion being expressed by the client towards the therapist, s/he's told that s/he's in a state of "transference."

Argh!

By: Douglas Eby

Douglas Eby — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 04:41:00 +0000

This can even be a problem for some mental health professionals who may not understand giftedness well enough, and presume people have ADHD, OCD and other disorders, when they really do not. See James Webb, PhD article Mis-Diagnosis and Dual Diagnosis of Gifted Children.

By: Erika

Erika — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 17:52:00 +0000

fontalonz,

Of course obsessive compulsive symptoms can manifest in other disorders. My mother's family has a fairly broad range of OC-spectrum disorders--from obsessive compulsive disorder proper to eating disorders to obsessive compulsive personality disorder. Yet, none of these people "gets really OCD" about anything. They have mental disorders and respect the usage of these terms.

The people I hear this usage from are people without psychiatric illness who are particularly fastidious or zealous in some aspect of their lives--more than they consider normal but hardly approaching the clinical range. Jeremy very rightly trimmed my diatribe, but I think the conclusion of it might clarify the context in which the usage is annoying:

"Further, such usages dilute the meanings of words. Obsessive compulsive disorder is not fastidiousness, not diligence. We already have perfectly good words for these concepts, and replacing these words with psychobabble doesn't make anyone sound smarter."