sonia | Links: psychology

Book Review: All Therapy Books by Scott Alexander. "Previous forms of therapy have required years or even decades to produce ambiguous results. Our form of therapy can produce total transformation in five to ten sessions! Previous forms of therapy have only helped ameliorate the stress of symptoms. Our form of therapy destroys symptoms at the root!"

What Doesn’t Motivate ADHD Adults to Follow Through by Marla Cummins. "Trying to force yourself to work tops my list of strategies that don’t usually work for adults with ADHD." Instead, engineer your environment, create interest, and be willing to tolerate discomfort.

Being-with the being-without : relational focusing with substance misusers (PDF) by Alan Tidmarsh. A somewhat technical article on "how therapeutic relationship and therapeutic focusing might live in the same space, speak the same language and support each other." It spoke to me about what I'm finding in my own practice: being present as a fellow vulnerable human is crucially important to helping traumatized people heal.

Dying to Leave, Trying to Live: My Depression Journey by John Pavlovitz. A succinct description of living with suicidal depression. Includes resources at the end: "Note: If you're struggling with depression, desire to self-harm, or suicidal thoughts, talk to someone at the National Suicide Prevention lifeline at 1-800-273-8255. Help can also be found here and here and here now."

What kind of thinking makes you good at strategy & tactics? by

yhlee. Fascinating comments, including a link to INTJ Personality Type – The “Strategist” which is interesting to me as a (reportedly rare) female INTJ.

Does news coverage of traffic crashes affect perceived blame and preferred solutions? Evidence from an experiment by Tara Goddard, Kelcie Ralph, Calvin G. Thigpen, Evan Iacobucci. Readable summary of research, with important points on how language affects attribution of blame when a car driver kills a pedestrian. "Even subtle differences in editorial patterns significantly affected readers’ attribution of blame and choice of punishment. Shifting from pedestrian-focused to driver-focused language reduced victim-blaming and increased perceived fault of the driver. A thematic frame ("10th fatality this year") significantly increased support for infrastructure improvements."

Making Sense of Autogynephilia Debates by Julia Serano. "1) The theory (and the evidence against it) in a nutshell, 2) Trans women’s objections to the theory (on top of it being incorrect), and 3) So who still believes autogynephilia theory, and what are their rationales?"

In fandom, please be careful about how negative you are, and how you are negative. by

xparrot. "tl;dr: make squee, not war?" Thoughtful post, and ongoing discussion in comments.

How My Wife Can Stand Me by John Scalzi. Heartwarming recipe for a long, functional, loving marriage.