Not so silly childrens' game

Last weekend has been busy for me - I had a guest over from Norway, who joined me and my boyfriend to a big music festival. Thus, no long entry, but I wanted to comment on a conversation we had.

For some reason, our houseguest - let's call him Sugar just to annoy him - came to the topic of Peek-a-boo. He was essentially commenting that it was the stupidest thing. After all, wouldn't you be majorly freaked out if someone came up to you, hid their face behind their hands and then took their hands away shouting "Peek-a-boo!"? I have to admit, I would be.

The thing is, I'm a bit older than the children I'd play peek-a-boo with. Peek-a-boo is pretty much designed as a training in object permanence, and if you make it to 23 (well, almost) without getting THAT down, you have a problem.

Object permanence refers to the fact that just because you can't see something, that doesn't mean it's not there. That might seem obvious, but it's not when you're brandnew at life. As it turns out, babies younger than 6 months have no clue about it. If you hide their favorite toy under a napkin, they'll think it's just gone. After that they slowly start grasping that, hey, their toy didn't just disappear. You're just an ass who keep hiding it from them and they can take it back! It'll be a bit tenuous for a while - they'll be confused if you hide it somewhere else than they're used to and look in the original hiding spot - but at about 9 months they usually know how it works.

The thing is, that this doesn't just go for their favorite toy. It goes for everything, including people. Mommy hiding her face, and then reappearing, teaches them that mommy, too, will not disappear if she's out of sight for a while.

So, play peek-a-boo with your kids a lot. And enjoy the fact that they like the fact you don't go away. It won't last that long.

Safety in numbers

A few years ago, I got to attend a concert by former Pink Floyd leadsman Roger Waters. I'm a great fan of the work of both the group and the man, so I was thrilled.

One of the absolute musts at a concert of both the current Pink Floyd (in so much as that still exists) is of course "The Wall", so several songs from that album got played. Among others, there was "Run", a song that strongly refers to racist riots. As the mass of people around me got into the song, I could feel the mob mentality rising. Safety in numbers, my ass - this felt like people here would do any stupid thing that'd occur to the man on the stage.

The thing is, there is safety in numbers - safety from having to feel responsible. And that is the thing that happens in riots. Because there are so many people doing something - breaking into stores, throwing rocks at the police, trashing cars, and whatever else you care to come up with - no one person feels responsible anymore. After all, everyone else is doing it, so why should *you* feel responsible? So you go ahead and join in the chaos. After all, it's pretty satisfying to see and hear a window smash under your hands - or so I imagine, anyways, knowing the way I gloat when I hear my mage's fireballs hit in my computer games.

The other side of that medal is when people *don't* do something when they *should* be doing something. Like when people are hurt in a busy street and everyone just passes them by, or when no one intervenes when someone is getting beat up. People take their cues from people around them - if no one else is stopping, why should you? A stranger in the street isn't *your* responsibility, is he?

The way to break this is rather simple. Remind people of their responsibility. If you are the person being passed by, instead of the person passing by, call out, not to people in general, but to one specific person. The lady in the blue coat is far more likely to respond when you call to *her* instead of to the abstract general populace.

And if no one else is stopping, why should she? Because *she* is the one being called to.

Psychology students' disease... with a twist

Anyone ever hear of medical students' disease? Apparently, doctors in the general area of a medicine faculty can tell what is being taught during that period, because medical students start appearing, claiming to have whatever type of disease they are currently learning about. We all have a great many symptoms of anything when we're looking for them, it seems.

Psychology students, and particularly students of clinical psychology (that is, those of us who like to occupy their time with crazies) get that too, but with a twist. More than thinking we have a disorder ourselves, we start seeing them all around us. The socially awkward statistics professor? Clearly autistic. The housemate who can't decide on one boyfriend and changes her opinion of you at the speed of light? Borderline, obviously. Friend having a rough week? Better make sure she doesn't have a depression!

Maybe if we're really honest, we'll admit we see them in ourselves, too. I've recognized traits of autism in myself, and a fellow intern is fairly convinced she has ADHD. But really, mostly, we see them in others.

The thing is, while most people may not have a disorder that could or should be diagnosed, this recognition isn't necessarily wrong. The thing about mental disorders is that they're not a matter of you either have them or you don't - you have them to some extent. Mental disorders aren't some kind of completely alien state that some people are in and the rest of us aren't. Mental disorders are extremes of normal, healthy behavior.

For some disorders, this is easy to understand. We're all sad sometimes, and seeing depression as an extreme of that isn't that hard. And you can probably point out people in your surroundings who are more stable, and others who are less so, so seeing borderline personality disorder as an extreme of that isn't that far-fetched either.

For other problems, this may seem like a bold statement. After all, what's normal and healthy about hallucinations or having multiple personalities? But I think we've all had moments when you are convinced you see something, or hear someone call your name, and then find that you imagined it. And all of us are a bit of a different person when we're working than when we are with our lovers or friends.

So, if disorder are all extremes of normal behavior, where do you put the line? At what point does normal behavior become a disorder?

The answer to that is both simple and complicated: a disorder is when you're on such an extreme of normal behavior that you can't function anymore. What's complicated about that, you say? The part where different people need to be able to do different things to function, and have different definitions of functioning. If you're a surgeon who becomes afraid of open wounds after an accident, for example, that keeps you from performing your profession, and thus hinders your functioning. If you work at a bank, that same fear won't be so much of a problem, since you don't get in touch with open wounds a whole lot. In the first case, it will be considered a disorder. In the second, it won't. Being afraid of snakes is far more likely to be considered a disorder if you live in, say, the Australian Outback, where you are likely to actually encounter them, than if, like me, you live in north-western Europe, where you won't find any snakes until the greenhouse effect takes a better hold on us.

At the end of the day, though, there's really only one conclusion to be drawn: we're all crazy. Some of us are just more crazy than others.

Psychology for the masses

A good friend of mine studied theology, and posts about that topic in her blog with some regularity. I've always been impressed with the way she manages to bring what can be a boring, stuffy subject to us lay people in a way that is not only understandable, but fun and interesting.

My field is psychology, and in my internship, which I just finished, I was told that I write well, and that I explain things well. So, I thought, why not see if I, too, can take an academic subject, and turn it into something fun and interesting for the curious?

This is my attempt.