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Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

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Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#51

Post by jrm4 »

lvass wrote: post #40
jrm4 wrote: post #27

If anything, I find this to be a, perhaps unintentional, damning indictment of psychology and psychiatry in general. If your discipline cannot clearly define things in a reasonably concrete and provable way, such that it is readily apparent to the patients and the public at large, and also such that the language effectively clarifies itself out of necessity, then much of what you do needs to be strongly questioned --…

The data is pretty clear that psychology and psychiatry sucks at doing it's job. But it's a hell of a tough job, and using more meaningful words probably doesn't hurt.

Exactly: "Meaningful."

Precisely, it feels like there's a lot of "activity" and "named ideas" chasing things that may not meaningfully exist? This is of course symptomatic of "publish or perish" et al, but I suppose one of the difficulties here is that the paper is like "here are some bad ideas and trends (fair) so here are some more to counteract that."

It really just gives the impression of "wow, these people are wasting time if they can't even decide on what relatively accessible words even mean?"

E.g. The bit on "symptoms" is crazy sounding.

Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#52

Post by raxxorraxor »

andsoitis wrote: post #10

What do others here think about casual use of the word "crazy" in a work setting. For instance, "that's a crazy idea" or "they're crazy to think ...."

If that is a challange to you, you might be directly affected? Although English isn't my native tongue and I learned it on the internet. I might be resilient...

Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#53

Post by jrm4 »

c7b wrote: post #49
jrm4 wrote: post #27

If anything, I find this to be a, perhaps unintentional, damning indictment of psychology and psychiatry in general. If your discipline cannot clearly define things in a reasonably concrete and provable way, such that it is readily apparent to the patients and the public at large, and also such that the language effectively clarifies itself out of necessity, then much of what you do needs to be strongly questioned --…

Frankly, if your standard for a good definition is that it is readily apparent to the public at large , then pretty much every academic discipline will fail your rigour test. Even (or especially) mathematics. Which should make it clear that this is an unfair and useless standard to hold psychology up to.

Fair, "at large" is a bit extreme. This is a spectrum. But psychology appears to be far worse than the others, even reading from this paper. I'm a lawyer, and even law isn't this bad. "Symptoms are unobservable?"

Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#54

Post by Cthulhu_ »

MichaelCollins wrote: post #26
lupire wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see the difference. Both "Politically Correct" and "Psychiatrically Correct" are addressing the same concern of misconceptions due to inaccurate or misleading language. You can be houseless but not homeless, and still need help with your housing.

Huh? If you live in a condo, you have no house but you are not homeless. A house is only one kind of shelter that can be a home, of many.

It could also refer to the difference between living in someone's spare room, couch surfing, or living in a camper van vs having a home (rented or bought).

Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#55

Post by MichaelCollins »

AnonCoward42 wrote: post #34
lupire wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see the difference. Both "Politically Correct" and "Psychiatrically Correct" are addressing the same concern of misconceptions due to inaccurate or misleading language. You can be houseless but not homeless, and still need help with your housing.

Unhoused vs homeless looks like a good example of a euphemism treatmill (in progress). Their state is not being altered by the "finer" wording instead it sounds pretentious and condescending. There are a lot of these political correct terms that are being used more cynically by now, however I'd prefer to not open that can of worms.

Good example of this from the article: "alcohol use disorder (formerly called alcoholism)"

Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#56

Post by Cthulhu_ »

mc32 wrote: post #30
ltbarcly3 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not the case. Often the "politically correct" version is not actually more correct, but is replacing some common phrase that is declared obnoxious by some very small unrepresentative minority of people who coincidentally make their living as activists. Yes you can be houseless but not homeless, but you can also be homeless and not houseless. It's an utterly stupid distinction predicated on an intentionally in…

Some iconic precursors to PC speech was the redefinition of role titles. Janitor which everyone was familiar with would be replaced with "sanitation engineer" or something similar which conveyed less what the person did do.

It kinda sounds like classism or wage related; "janitor" or "cleaner" sounds common, a "sanitation engineer" or "chief housekeeping manager" sounds like they would earn more.

Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#57

Post by raxxorraxor »

Barrin92 wrote: post #32
alexb_ wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's crazy that we spend time thinking about minor bs like this instead of spending that effort trying to solve actual problems. This type of stuff is great for people who want to feel like they have made a positive change without actually having accomplished anything of value.

being precise in your language is of great value, both when it comes to thinking and communicating. Per Wittgenstein, "the limits of my language mean the limits of my world". If you're a software developer you should be familiar with how important syntactic precision is. Someone who runs around the office and complains about everything being 'so crazy' is genuinely not articulating anything meaningful but just rantin…

"limits of my language mean the limits of my world".

The arguments to replace certain words would do the opposite though.

On the other hand, sometimes expression is not too important to transport a point.

Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#58

Post by lvass »

photochemsyn wrote: post #7

Looking at the headline, one might think this is another tedious guide to what (arguably) constitutes politically correct language in modern society (case example: "use 'unhoused' in favor of 'homeless'"), but it's actually a collection of well-researched and documented examples of misuse of technical terms. For example: > " Chemical imbalance . Thanks in part to the success of direct-to-consumer marketing campaigns…

Agreed. I despise political correctness yet appreciate this list, using precise language is always a good idea. I clicked in ready to see "shell shock" being renamed for the third time in less than a century, but that type of shenanigan is not what this article is about.

Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#59

Post by [deleted] »

jrm4 wrote: post #53
c7b wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Frankly, if your standard for a good definition is that it is readily apparent to the public at large , then pretty much every academic discipline will fail your rigour test. Even (or especially) mathematics. Which should make it clear that this is an unfair and useless standard to hold psychology up to.

Fair, "at large" is a bit extreme. This is a spectrum. But psychology appears to be far worse than the others, even reading from this paper. I'm a lawyer, and even law isn't this bad. "Symptoms are unobservable?"

[deleted]

Re: Psychological and psychiatric terms to avoid

#60

Post by raxxorraxor »

BrainVirus wrote: post #38

>Nevertheless, the attitude-change techniques used by so-called “brainwashers” are no different than standard persuasive methods identified by social psychologists, such as encouraging commitment to goals, manufacturing source credibility, forging an illusion of group consensus, and vivid testimonials Ok, let me get this straight. You openly admit that brainwashing techniques are now routinely and knowingly used in "…

I think in most cases the argument of precision is warranted, but this might indeed be a bit much. Especially since psychology and clinical psychology needs accountability and the author used the weakest meaning of brain washing, a term quite precise for the worst deeds of the profession.
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