Ella Maxwell We all know Thanksgiving is one of the best times to gather round with your loved ones, eat a turkey, and be grateful. It is of course, Thanksgiving. But what David DeSteno brings to light in his article in the New York Times, Why Gratitude is Wasted on Thanksgiving, is that we could use a little less gratitude on this day, and perhaps some more for the rest of the year. Gratitude does a number of wonderful things for us and our relationships, as proven by a small study run by DeSteno. In this experiment he proved a number of things. For one, he was able to prove that having gratitude keeps us more honest. DeSteno and a team of psychologists ran a test, they told people participating in the experiment to flip a coin, and if heads, they would get a money reward. If it was tails, there was no reward. The coin was rigged to always be tails. Those who were asked to count their blessings beforehand cheated at half the rate of those who did not. It is interesting to see what a little perspective will do for your decision making. DeSteno also says that gratitude is important for our generosity. If people participating in the experiment had counted their blessings and were therefore feeling grateful, they were more willing to share money with strangers when it was asked of them. In fact, on average they were 12 percent more likely than those who were not feeling particularly grateful. At this point you may be wondering how this really relates to Thanksgiving. It is unlikely on this day that people will want to “cheat” or be unfriendly. As DeSteno puts it, it just is not very tempting. Still not convinced? Let’s look at a couple more examples on what makes gratitude so important all of the time. Gratitude enhances self-control. Going off of the experiment results I previously explained, those who were grateful after counting their blessings were less inclined to take a small amount of money for themselves in hand, as they were able to focus on their long term investment gains. A final important thing that gratitude does for us is it increases our productivity. In a different study run by psychologists Francesca Gino and Adam Grant, they tested the effect of a boss expressing gratitude to his/her employees at a fund-raising business. By doing so, the efforts of the employees rose 33 percent. That’s awesome! Gratitude can go a long way. Taking a few steps back and seeing the bigger picture will help us to understand how this relates to Thanksgiving. Quite simply, it is easy to be grateful on Thanksgiving. Most are surrounded by those they love and a luxurious meal with a homey setting. On a day designated for giving thanks, it is easy to find these things to be grateful for. What is important is what you do with all of the other days in your year. As I have made clear, being grateful improves our honesty, generosity, productivity, and self-control. Without it, it is easy to lose perspective on life. Not only this, but relationships could not be formed the way they are. We are inclined to get to know people better and form stronger bonds when we are grateful for the way they acted towards us. Without this motive, relationships would be harder. So, as you sit down this Thursday to a Thanksgiving meal and think about all that you are grateful for, keep in mind all the other days of the year you have to be grateful. Happy Turkey Day! Desteno, D. (2019, November 23). Why Gratitude Is Wasted on Thanksgiving. Retrieved November 25, 2019, from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/23/opinion/sunday/thanksgiving-gratitude.html?searchResultPosition=1 image:https://www.123rf.com/photo_87550453_family-eating-traditional-thanksgiving-turkey-on-a-festive-table-background-roasted-turkey-family-ce.html
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By Sophie Dickson Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night and you just aren't sure how to go back to sleep? Dreading the alarm clock that wakes you up at 6 A.M., most try to go back to sleep. Although our goal may be to go back to sleep, some of the things we do actually do the opposite. Things like midnight snacks, bathroom trips, and checking your phone actually keep you wide awake. Instead, stay in the dark and try to lower your heart rate by taking deep breaths. Another thing that can help put you right back to sleep is a white noise machine or some type of motionless background noise. This is because if you brain hears something such as a dripping drain or a breeze from an open window, you won't be able to sleep because it doesn't sense it is safe to. When you happen to wake up in the middle of the night, stay positive and just try some of these strategies to get right back to sleep. The six best way to achieve the goal of staying asleep are: staying in the dark, remain in bed, block out noise, keep room at a pleasant temperature, quiet your mind, and lastly think positively. Staying positive is a very important part of falling back asleep. Don't worry about your alarm clock, just enjoy the last couple of hours you have to sleep. Don't Go Onto Your Phone...Usually when anyone wakes up in the middle of the night, their first reaction is to go to their phone. This is something that might comfort people with a fear of the dark, but will not help you get back to sleep. Dr.Hanifin, a professor at Thomas Jefferson University, has a lot to say about the sleep/wake cycle. "They're point sources of light that your eyes are drawn to, and that can keep you up". Here he is explaining how little points of light like a car driving by or your phone screen can simply keep you awake for hours. One strategy to falling back asleep is to relax your mind and try to clear whatever thoughts that are keeping you awake. Going onto you phone will keep you mind wide awake and therefore you are losing sleep because you couldn't stay off you phone. Does Temperature Play a Role in Sleep?The one thing that wakes most people up in the middle of the night is, believe it or not, temperature. According to Dr.Breus, "Another part of the sleep equation is skin temperature". A perfect sleep temperature is a cool core with comfortably warm skin. The cool air you breathe in, allows you to keep a cool core and prevents you from overheating. Things like your pajamas and blankets will keep your skin temperature at a comfortable level. Dr.Raymann, who is a published researcher in the journal Physiology and Behavior, says that socks could be a good way to keep you body temperature regulated while sleeping. The temperature sensors on your feet transmits messages to your brain when warm that cause you to doze off. Small things like temperature can help you stay asleep or wake up in the middle of the night. Sleep Mask Experiment...The sleep-mask that is recommended by Dr.Hanifin has a circular space for you eye that allows you to open and close your eyes at will. The sleep-mask helps people sleep by being able to open your eyes when you wake up at night without the source light that will keep your brain active and awake. This improves sleep because the point sources of light doesn't draw your attention anymore and allows your brain to go to sleep and shut down. This subject interested me because I have always wondered why it is so hard to go to sleep once you wake up in the middle of the night. I always had trouble when I was little going back to sleep after waking up and it was interesting to learn why that is. Overall, sleeping with a sleep-mask of any kind will improve your sleep if you often wake up in the night because the point sources of light will not be a factor to keeping you awake. APA Link Citation: Chen, Joanne. “Wide-Awake at 3 A.M.? Don’t Just Look at Your Phone.” The New York Times, 30 Aug. 2019. NYTimes.com, https://thewirecutter.com/blog/wide-awake-at-3-am-dont-just-look-at-your-phone/. Sleep Deprivation Article Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/30/smarter-living/wirecutter/wide-awake-at-3-am-dont-just-look-at-your-phone.html Image 1 Link: file:///Users/student/Desktop/desktop%20photos%20/embeddedIMG_WakingUpAtNight_850px_1-600x600.jpg Image 2 Link: file:///Users/student/Desktop/desktop%20photos%20/embeddedIMG_WakingUpAtNight_850px_4-600x600.jpg Image3Link:https://www.google.com/search?safe=strict&biw=1366&bih=657&tbm=isch&sa=1&ei=fH_dXa36G8yk_QaOpYewDA&q=cartoon+thermometer&oq=cartoon+ther&gs_l=img.1.0.0l10.18848416.18866180..18868736...2.0..0.229.1772.5j9j1......0....1..gws-wiz-img.....0..0i67j0i8i30j0i24j0i131.U4-PxobEx1w#imgrc=QttRYzTFoP6GgM:
Post Written by Jill Oestreicher
By: Ava Gillan The brain is, by far, the most confounding part of the human body. With its trillions of neurons, many interconnected parts, and mysterious secrets to our personalities, beliefs, and emotions, our brains hold the key to who we are as individuals. Although the brain is unquestionably dynamic, it’s not indestructible. Millions of people around the world have been diagnosed with neurological disorders. In fact, about every one of six people in the world’s population suffers from neurological complications. However, these diseases not only include common ones such as Allzhiemer’s and Parkinson’s. New research has uncovered unfamiliar neurological disorders that have previously been dismissed and misdiagnosed. One such example is a rare, newly discovered disease called anti-NMDA autoimmune encephalitis. To summarize, it can basically be described as your own body attacking your brain. People under the influence of this disease often present symptoms such as hallucinations, delusions, and eventually, epileptic seizures. Many neurological disorders have similarities to these symptoms, such as schizophrenia. This is why anti-NMDA autoimmune encephalitis is so hard to pin down at first.
Susannah Cahalan, author of the books “Brain on Fire” and “The Great Pretender” was hospitalized with severe and confusing symptoms that terrified her family when she was only 24 years old. She was seeing things, such as an army of bed bugs that were invading her apartment. She believed that her father had tried to abduct her and kill his wife, her stepmother. She believed that she could age people using just her mind. She didn't eat or sleep, and she often spoke nonsense. Eventually, Susannah went into a catatonic state. After being studied by various doctors, Susannah was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Her doubtful parents demanded second opinions before taking further steps to secure her uncertain future. Susannah could have ended up in a psychiatric ward if it wasn’t for a doctor who was brought in specifically to consult her case. She was only the 217th person to be diagnosed with this disease. She was among the first to receive a mixture of drugs, including steroids, which she claims saved her life. Susannah’s condition is what is called in medicine a “great pretender”, hence the name of her second book. Because her disorder “pretended” or “mimicked” the symptoms of other disorders, confused doctors kept coming up with many different leads. The 1973 study that questioned psychiatrist' abilities to successfully diagnose patients with mental illness lead to an ongoing crisis of sorts. Stanford psychologist and author of this study, “On Being Sane In Insane Places”, David Rosenhan, was at the heart of this crisis. Rosenhan’s study involved eight “sane” volunteers who would appear at a mental hospital, entering under false names. These volunteers claimed to have false symptoms, such as hearing voices and seeing things. The purpose of this experiment was to test the vitality of psychiatric diagnosis. In other words, to test the accuracy of psychiatric diagnoses. All “pseudopatients”, as the volunteers were called, were admitted to different hospitals. They stayed there anywhere from a week to 52 days. In the end, all but one received the diagnosis of schizophrenia. A few real patients at the hospitals suspected that the volunteers were fakers, but the staff seemed oblivious. Differences in Rosenhan’s study and in his papers began to emerge. The study had alarming statistics from the pseudopatients in the hospitals. Contact with doctor only averaged about 6.8 minutes a day, and 71% of doctors didn’t even respond when a pseudopatient addressed them. But Rosenhan’s notes didn’t match with his statistics. It was assumed that some of the differences between the study and the papers could be sloppiness. But others looked more deliberate. Nonetheless, Rosenhan’s study made him a celebrity in the psychology world. Although Rosenhan died in 2012, his work remains one of the most cited papers in social science to this day. Susannah fervently went in search of the pseudopatients on a quest to understand more about her own neuro experience. In his notes, Rosenhan had revealed that he had volunteered himself for his own experiment. But the identity of the others was kept a secret. It was said that one of them was a famous female abstract painter, but Susannah hit a dead end when she tried to find her. In the end, she only managed to find one of the original eight volunteers, as well as a man who had participated in the experiment as a ninth pseudopatient but whose results were omitted from the findings. This “ninth” volunteer told Susannah that his experience at the mental hospital had actually been beneficial to him, helping him to learn more about himself during his time there. This completely contradicted Rosenhan’s whole purpose of the experiment. Rosenhan, wanting his experiment to be successful, had quietly excluded his research on the ninth volunteer from his experiment. In his journal, Rosenhan had only written one scathing note about the ninth pseudopatient: HE LIKED IT, referring to the mental hospital. By pursuing elusive information about this study, Susannah learned that Rosenhan had purposely fudged his own psychiatric experiment in order to prove that his hypothesis was correct, even though the true results revealed that he was wrong. As a result, Susannah developed a deeper respect for mental illness. Continued research on anti-NMDA autoimmune encephalitis can help open doors to the discovery of other unexplored neurological disorders. Psychiatric wards may contain growing numbers of misdiagnosed people. It is imperative that we detect these rare yet inevitably curable diseases before their victims reach the point of no return, at which point they will have suffered too much neurological damage to salvage any part of who they once were. At a mental hospital in North Carolina, Susannah presented her case to a doctor and soon stumbled across a female patient with the same neurological disorder Susannah had overcome. Susannah referred to this patient as her “mirror image”. The patient she visited had suffered permanent mental damage and would forever operate as a child. Susannah, who had recovered all 100% of herself when she was cured, reflected on how her life might have been if she had survived with less than 100% of herself intact. Who knows how many people have been misdiagnosed with schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s and countless other diseases? These people might have been able to escape permanent neurological damage, had doctors discovered what they actually suffered from. As a nation, we need to invest more time and energy in neurological research that will not only save but preserve the quality of life of people who have the overwhelming vulnerability of being misdiagnosed. I believe that young adolescents in particular need to be more educated about the misdiagnosis of neurological disorders. While researching Susannah Cahalan's fascinating story, I was dismayed when I learned that there are many other Susannah Cahalans out there who have been misdiagnosed, and whose lives are now being spent in a psychiatric ward. I believe that extended research of this topic has the potential to be life-changing. APA Citation: Her Illness Was Misdiagnosed As Madness. Now Susannah Cahalan Takes On Madness in Medicine.Emily Eakin - https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/02/books/susannah-cahalan-great-pretender.html By: Lauren Dawes We all know being lonely can be bad for your health, but did you know spending time with yourself can be really good for you? Having time to yourself improves your relationships, boosts creativity and confidence and helps to regulate your emotions. Our minds are designed to engage in the world around us, even when we’re alone we find a way to focus on the outside world. Most restful things our bodies do are done solo and our bodies crave time alone. Sometimes we don’t even realize when we need time alone to feel better.
Enjoying alone time doesn’t correlate to being an introvert or an extrovert, everyone can benefit from alone time. Time alone helps us to discover new ideas without the influence of anyone else. Making the choice to be alone can also help to develop who you are, help you develop your sense of self and show you what your true interests are. Teens are less self-conscious when they are alone and it can help them to re-evaluate “filler” relationships. “Filler” relationships are friendships that you keep only because you’d rather do something than do nothing by yourself even if it’s with people that you don’t enjoy being around. People often mix up spending time alone with a negative feeling of loneliness. We should appreciate the time by ourselves which would prevent us from thinking that it’s a negative thing to be alone. People often forget that solitude can be a choice. Worrying too much about other people watching us can stop us from doing things that make us happy. Some people think being alone and being able to just think about anything can sometimes feel intimidating. You may feel like you have no one else to rely on when you’re by yourself. Studies have shown that when you’re by yourself the lack of stimuli can make you feel uncomfortable. A psychologist at the University of Virginia, Timothy Wilson, did a study with the results finding that doing something is better than doing nothing for most people. He found that most people aren’t comfortable in their own heads. The study revealed that most people would rather be doing something than to be doing nothing, even if that something is hurting themselves. One quarter of the women, and two-thirds of the men who participated in the study preferred to subject themselves to an electric shock instead of doing nothing and spending time alone! People don’t want to sit alone with their thoughts, many participants would rather listen to music, or use their phone. The study asked participants to be alone for 6-15 minutes. When in a room without their electronics or books, etc, they had to entertain themselves with their thoughts. Participants found it difficult to concentrate and their minds wandered. Many people stated they would rather do an unpleasant activity than nothing at all. This study concluded that smartphones might play a part in people's desire to always have something to do. People don’t like to disengage from the world and be alone. Being alone and being lonely are two very different things. Taking time for yourself to think, to rest your mind and do nothing, can be very healthy for all other aspects of your life. Some people find it very difficult to spend time alone. We live in a world where many things are competing for our attention, but sometimes we have to turn off all of the electronics and noise and pay attention to our own needs and thoughts. Higgs, M. M. (2019, October 29). Why You Should Find Time to Be Alone With Yourself. Retrieved November 20, 2019, from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/28/smarter-living/the-benefits-of-being-alone.html. Image: https://www.google.com/search?q=spending+time+alone&safe=active&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj_jcrFlIPmAhUPJt8KHcEGA8EQ_AUoAXoECBAQAw&biw=1366&bih=581#imgrc=_ Have you ever struggled with being alone? Rather, have you ever struggled with the FEELING of being alone? That's perfectly normal. In fact, many people all around the world struggle with the feeling of being alone. Being alone can actually be linked to negatively impact your health and emotions. In reality, being by yourself can have many benefits that you may be disregarding because of the illusion that being alone makes you unpopular or anti-social. The main difference between being alone and loneliness is the choice you have. For the act of being alone to work, you must be able to choose yourself over others sometimes. That way, you train yourself that it’s not that you don’t have friends, but it’s just because you want to chill out by yourself. Maybe you’re watching a movie, doing homework, or playing video games, but there are many things to do by yourself.
Emily Roberts, who is a pretty well-known psychotherapist, said that if people get better at identifying times when they need to be alone, it can actually recharge them and help them deal with more negative emotions that they might have, including stress, anxiety, and fear. Knowing yourself can even lead you to become a more empathetic person because by being with yourself you can recognize your own flaws and begin to know more about yourself, which will then increase your own life qualities with the people around you when you do decide to go out with a group of friends. One of the major studies from the University of Virginia surveyed a handful of people. In this survey, they were asked if they’d rather get shocked by an electric shock, or spend time alone with their thoughts. The majority would rather get shocked. So, where did this fear of being alone come from? From my own personal experiences, fear of being alone definitely has some to do with social status. If I’m looking at social media and I find one of my friends out with more of my friends, I start to wonder if I’m good enough and frantically try to find somebody to make a plan with. Sometimes even if there’s nothing happening, I still have a hard time with my own thoughts and being alone because I don’t know what to do with myself. I do play video games, but where’s the multiplayer? I do make videos, but where’s my partner? Most of the time I don’t realize that it’s very beneficial to spend time with myself, and that’s something I need to apply to my life. Being alone isn’t a bad thing. It is actually one of the best things you yourself can do for your physical and mental health. By training yourself to be alone, you can acquire new ideas, passions, and emotions for other people. Once you learn more about yourself and understand that being alone is a necessity for all human beings, the starving feeling you have for attention and popularity will dwindle. You SHOULD be alone. Tristan Winchester Higgs, M. M. (2019, October 29). Why You Should Find Time to Be Alone With Yourself. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/28/smarter-living/the-benefits-of-being-alone.html. https://www.thoughtco.com/being-alone-is-not-necessarily-bad-2833074 Animals are common in most households across the world, this lead psychologists to wonder if the presence of pets had a positive effect on children. Many families choose to buy a pet for the children in the family because they were deemed to have a positive effect. Researchers found that children with more empathy skills were more likely to develop relationships with the animals. It's not at all bad, seeing as kids with more difficulty socializing seek to form bonds with animals and even learn their social skills from this interaction. Children who suffer with obesity can easily get outdoors by walking their dogs, kids with weak immune systems can make theirs stronger living with pets for their life and even seeing seeing a pet after work or school can lift the spirits of a sad person. This study relates to me and my life because i've lived with pets my whole life, my parents have had pets since before i was born. I feel that coming home each day to my pets is such a stress reliever and fills me with happiness. I don't know if i could've made it in life without my pets greeting me every morning and when i come home from school. As an animal lover, i found this study very true as it related to my life as a child and now as a teenager. This study was preformed to see if pets were good for children at a younger age. It has shown that children with disabilities and mental disorders do seek animals for comfort and even learn from them. Even with all the supposed bad things pets can bring, they are extremely helpful in the household to help kids growing up. Klass, Perri. “Can Fido and Whiskers Enrich Children's Lives?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 9 Apr. 2012, well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/09/can-fido-and-whiskers-enrich-childrens-lives/.
By Clancy Walsh Do you ever question your childhood memories about your grandparents? Well you're not the only one. Grandparents worry about what their grandchildren will remember about them after they pass away. Many families experience their children not remembering what the grandparent wanted them to remember them by due to the child's memory. If one of your grandparents may have passed away when you were at a younger age the chance of remembering them correctly decreases. Although the grandparent may have played an important role in the grandchild’s life the memory of children is like “Childhood amnesia” as Freud calls it. Most young children form memories early in life but they forget them quickly, and they are unable to hold onto the memory. Paula Span (grandmother) spends one a week as daycare for her grandchild, and other time needed. She commutes from New Jersey to Brooklyn to spend time with her granddaughter. Paula questions what her granddaughter Bartola will remember about her. The two of them sing, read, stroll, spend full days together, but Bartola might not remember any of it. Grandparents want children to remember them and want them to think about their legacy by transmitting lessons about kindness, strength, confidence, and love. Bartola gets to go to the theater with her grandmother so she thinks of this “tradition” that her and her grandmother get to do when they get older. Psychologists talk about kids and autobiographical memory where they recall specific events of personal relevance, the child retains very little of what happened before the age of three. Paula repeats experiences her and Bartola have been through to strengthen Bartola’s recollections. Paula is taught to talk about the time she spends with her granddaughter and how they enjoy spending time with each other. Along with that, she should describe the details of what happened and what things looked like to help the memory Bartola. For example, if she wants Bartola to remember the summers on Cape Cod she should describe the hermit crabs, tide pools, etc. Using photos can help, it provides a chronological, pictorial narrative that kids and grandparents and parents can look at. As children repeat experiences it strengthens the child's recollections. Also, Paula wants Bartola to remember her in a way that she cared for her, comfort her, and that she was a nig part of her earlier life. This connects to feelings of attachment. This feeling of trust develops in early stages of life. Grandparents respond to their grandchildren with love, patience, and help them feel secure and valued which increases positive attachment. In this experiment, Paula uses new teachings she learned to try and get her granddaughter to remember her for the caring, kind, loving grandmother she is. This study relates to my own life in numerous different ways. To begin, I wonder if I remember my grandparents they way they intended me to. Since all of my grandparents besides one grandmother has passed away, it is challenging for me to remember the others because they passed away when I was at such a young age. Also, I never met two of my grandparents. I have some memories of my grandfather who passed away when I was three. Mostly from photos or being reminded of the time I spent with him. Overall, my life has some connections to this study. In conclusion, the implications of this study is grandparents are having concerns and questioning whether or not their grandchild will remember them with significance. Grandparents want to be remembered by their grandchildren in positive ways. They want to be remembered by the time they spent with each other and enjoyed it, and love, patience, and care they provide for their grandchild. Many grandparents find it concerning how their grandchildren may not remember them. Span, P. (2019, September 19). What Will My Grandchild Remember? Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/19/well/family/what-will-my-grandchild-remember.html. Do you ever have a hard time living in the moment? Trust me you're not the only one. Often we tend to teach ourselves to never savor the good days or experiences we have but to worry about when this peak will plunge to an end which is not quality of life. Research showed that the ability to experience and savor positive moments is the thing that improves the ability to deal with distress. So, the ability to be able to point out the positives in a situation shows someone has that self efficiency. Also, research from Sonja Lyubomirsky, a psychologist at the University of California, Riverside, says that experiencing these positive feelings and emotions increases the chance of you achieving your goals not set you up for disappointment. Although it may seem like you're preparing yourself for potential challenges, all it does is cause that anxiety of "what if?" You will conquer those conquests whenever they come! Some ways to help worrying include: Focus on values, not goals! It's easy to fall in the hole of debating your worth by the achievements you have already reached.No more seeing your hard work as “luck." When you downplay your accomplishments and skills it makes you think there will always be a negative outcome and it makes you skip that power of self-efficacy or how capable you are to do something. Having that mindset that you have the capacity to shape your life and rely on yourself to conquer your emotions effectively. And as said before, Worrying will take away present joy. Learning to accept that you won’t always be prepared for potential challenges/battles will teach you to focus on what is happening now and get to those conquests when they come because you don’t even know if they are! There is always the option of putting some time into meditation, I know sounds like a waste of time but it seriously can help. This can improve your ability to live right in the moment and enjoy it. When our brains worry it makes our body tense and uneasy, meditation helps relieve that tension by quieting both our mind and body to relaxation. The way I stop the worrying from controlling my life is I keep myself busy. Exercise, draw, homework, go for a walk, and hanging out with friends may take those worrying thoughts to the dump. Help yourself out! Stop worrying. - Mariah Paddack
Proulx, N. (2019, October 25). Are You a Worrier? Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/25/learning/are-you-a-worrier.html. Self-Harm. We are well aware that it happens. Maybe you've seen it in a movie or show. Perhaps you know someone whose self-harmed or have even done it yourself. The fact is we know about self-harm and have been turning our gaze away and avoiding it for far too long. If your awareness of the self-harm epidemic isn't mentioned above, self-harm is when someone cuts/burns themselves to relieve emotional pain or distress. Because many parents/guardians of teens and young adults that self-harm approach the matter with anger and misunderstanding, many of those who self-harm feel even more compelled to keep it a secret. About 1 in 5 adolescents have reported to have self-harmed at least once in their life. Keep in mind that that is solely reported data, and not nearly everyone who suffers as a result of self-injury is likely to report. Historically, when self-injury was almost unheard of. It was considered behavior only associated with victims of sexual abuse, the severely affected or impaired, or sufferers of major body alienation. This was even believed by doctors until it started to be prevalent among younger, wealthier generations (which was unforseen by specialists who treat it.) But most of the general population still doesn't really understand how self-harm became so prevalent from a neurological standpoint: the flood of neurological painkillers triggered by the brain to ease the pain of self-harm is comparable to that of a opiate habit (and can be just as addicting.) For some who engage in self-harm feel that the relief from psychological pain is worth the physical pain. For others, self-harm is comforting because it resembles some control; you might not be able to control what others do or say that might cause psychological, mental or emotional pain, but there is some control in initiating physical pain. What almost all studies/surveys have found is that everyone who self-injures does so for differing reasons. Before we get into how to treat self-injury, it's important to note that SELF-HARM IS NOT THE SAME AS A SUICIDE ATTEMPT. Although those who self-harm are twice as likely to commit suicide, habitual self-harm could have nothing to do with suicide at all. Diagnosing self-injury or any contributing mental illness is a difficult matter, and even more difficult to treat. In the psychiatric system, self-harm is considered a symptom of an underlying mental illness and isn't considered a valid as a stand-alone diagnosis. Because of this, it's extremely difficult to find psychologists or clinics that solely devoted to preventing self-harm. As of now, the only effective treatment for self-injury is specialized talk therapy, but the study of treatment is still very much in its infancy. All that's definitive in self-harm today is that we have a lot to learn, and a lot to improve on. If you or someone you know struggles with self-injury, here are some online resources: - Text CONNECT to 741741 for 24/7 support - This Crisis text line will connect you to a live and well-trained crisis counselor available to talk anytime about any crisis. - Self Harm Hotline: 1-800-366-8288 - Self-injury Foundation’s National Crisis Line: 1-800-334-HELP The link below lists some healthy alternatives to self-injury: https://www.helpguide.org/articles/anxiety/cutting-and-self-harm.htm Stay kind, safe, and understanding. :) - Callie M |
Ms. Carrigan's Psych ClassWe have been reading articles about psychological studies to inform the way we live our lives. Please explore, and we hope you learn a bit about the psychology in your life! Categories
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