Download or read book The Origins of Unhappiness written by David Smail and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-05-08 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is the main argument of this book that emotional and psychological distress is often brought about through the operation of social-environmental powers which have their origin at a considerable distance from those ultimately subjected to them. On the whole, psychology has concerned itself very little with the field of power which stretches beyond our immediate relations with each other, and this has led to serious limitations on the explanatory power of the theories it has produced. To illustrate this, typical cases of patient distress in the 1980s are examined. The decade when the right-wing of politics proclaimed there was no such thing as society gave rise to psychological distress across social classes, as long-standing societal institutions were dismantled. This is as much a work of sociology, politics, and philosophy, as it is of psychology. Fundamentals of an environmental understanding of distress are outlined. A person is the interaction of a body with the environment.
Download or read book The Origins of Unhappiness written by David Smail and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through his examination of how visible and invisible social power - institutions, politics, the Establishment - wields an influence over our lives often beyond our immediate control, Smail leads us to a clear understanding of distress.'
Download or read book Power Interest and Psychology written by David John Smail and published by Pccs Books. This book was released on 2005 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Smail establishes a compelling framework that makes sense of our emotional distress as the outcome of contextual, social pressures.
Download or read book How to Survive Without Psychotherapy written by David Smail and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-05-08 with total page 162 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is directly aimed at sufferers of mental distress. The book's aim is to remove from sufferers the burden of 'fault' for their pain and to demystify some of the practices that surround the 'treatment' of mental illness. It is not exactly a self-help book because it is a false claim of any 'treatment' of mental illness that 'cure' can be brought about by exercise of will. Much of what causes mental distress is lack of power and resource, outside the control of the sufferer. Surviving without psychotherapy involves the appreciation of several things. First, the limited nature of therapeutic assistance - whilst clarification and support may help the sufferer understand his/her predicament and encourage the use of what resources the sufferer has, therapy cannot change the distal root causes of distress. Second, that only socio-political solutions can address some of the most powerful causes of distress, e.g., redundancy, housing and poverty. In sounding a cautionary note about psychoanalysis, Smail observes that mental distress is far more about money than sex.
Download or read book Taking Care written by David Smail and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-05-08 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Taking Care established the author as an important social and political analyst whose background happened to be in clinical psychology. In this work the author develops the analysis of mental illness, and psychology in general, in the contexts of society, power and interest. People's experience is embodied in the world in which they exist. Notwithstanding the claims of some, psychology cannot, in the same way that magic cannot, change the nature of that experience fundamentally. At best, psychotherapy might provide a degree of understanding about that limitation. The historical relationship between psychology and magic is examined. The socio-political and economic structures of the society in which we live have the greatest influence on mental health, as on many other matters. Therefore, the individuation of focus in psychology on personal relationships, happiness, and sexuality can significantly miss the point. We need to develop political and social structures that 'take care' of people, to enable them to have meaningful 'public' lives.
Download or read book Illusion and Reality written by David Smail and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-05-08 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work challenges the notion that anxiety and depression amount to a mental illness denoting that something is wrong with the individual sufferer. Instead, anxiety and depression are described as perfectly rational responses to difficulties in the sufferer's world, experienced subjectively by that person. An essential contrast is drawn between objective conceptions of normality (what reality ought to be as per commercial and other objectifying sources) and the reality of the individual's subjective experience of the world (abuse, unemployment, and so on). Chapters include tackling the myth of normality; examining shyness; and analysing the way in which assumptions behind the use of language can foster anxiety and depression. The book's primary purpose is to explain the meaning of anxiety as experienced by the sufferer. These insights also lead to a view, by way of secondary purpose, that the role of the therapist is not in 'curing' the individual, but rather to negotiate demystification and to provide insight into the effects of the problems in the sufferer's world, based on the sufferer and the therapist's shared subjective understanding.
Download or read book The Empire of Depression written by Jonathan Sadowsky and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2020-10-22 with total page 196 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Depression has colonized the world. Today, more than 300 million of us have been diagnosed as depressed. But 150 years ago, "depression" referred to a mood, not a sickness. Does that mean people weren't sick before, only sad? Of course not. Mental illness is a complex thing, part biological, part social, its definition dependent on time and place. But in the mid-twentieth century, even as European empires were crumbling, new Western clinical models and treatments for mental health spread across the world. In so doing, "depression" began to displace older ideas like "melancholia," the Japanese "utsushô," or the Punjabi "sinking heart" syndrome. Award-winning historian Jonathan Sadowsky tells this global story, chronicling the path-breaking work of psychiatrists and pharmacists, and the intimate sufferings of patients. Revealing the continuity of human distress across time and place, he shows us how different cultures have experienced intense mental anguish, and how they have tried to alleviate it. He reaches an unflinching conclusion: the devastating effects of depression are real. A number of treatments do reduce suffering, but a permanent cure remains elusive. Throughout the history of depression, there have been overzealous promoters of particular approaches, but history shows us that there is no single way to get better that works for everyone. Like successful psychotherapy, history can liberate us from the negative patterns of the past.
Download or read book Civilization and Its Discontents written by Sigmund Freud and published by Courier Dover Publications. This book was released on 1994-01-01 with total page 81 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: (Dover thrift editions).
Download or read book The Origins of Happiness written by Andrew E. Clark and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2019-08-27 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A new perspective on life satisfaction and well-being over the life course What makes people happy? The Origins of Happiness seeks to revolutionize how we think about human priorities and to promote public policy changes that are based on what really matters to people. Drawing on a range of evidence using large-scale data from various countries, the authors consider the key factors that affect human well-being, including income, education, employment, family conflict, health, childcare, and crime. The Origins of Happiness offers a groundbreaking new vision for how we might become more healthy, happy, and whole.
Download or read book Hysteria written by Andrew Scull and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-10-13 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The story of hysteria is a curious one, for it persists as an illness for centuries before disappearing. Andrew Scull gives a fascinating account of this socially constructed disease that came to be strongly associated with women, showing the shifts in social, cultural, and medical perceptions through history.
Download or read book The Social Leap written by William von Hippel and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2018-11-13 with total page 387 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A study of how evolution has forged our modern lives—from work and relationships to leadership and innovation, as well as our quest for happiness. Human psychology is rife with contradictions: We work hard to achieve our goals, but happiness at our success is fleeting. We hope our friends will do well in life but can’t help feeling jealous if they do too well. We’re aghast at the thought of people we know being murdered but are unconcerned when our armed forces kill enemies we’ve never met. We complain about difficult bosses but are often just as bad when we’re in charge. These inconsistencies may seem irrational, but each of them has evolved to serve a vital function in our lives. Indeed, the most fundamental aspects of our psychology were permanently shaped by the “social leap” our ancestors made from the rainforest to the savannah. In their struggle to survive on the open grasslands, our ancestors prioritized teamwork and sociality over physical prowess, creating an entirely new kind of intelligence that would forever alter our place on this planet. A blend of anthropology, biology, history, and psychology with evolutionary science, The Social Leap traces our evolutionary history to show how events in our distant past continue to shape our lives today. From why we exaggerate to why we believe our own lies, the implications are far-reaching and extraordinary. Praise for The Social Leap Winner of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology Book Prize “A rollicking tour through humanity’s evolutionary past. . . . Von Hippel shows how our past explains the present and why our well-being rests on an understanding of how our minds evolved.” —Adam Alter, New York Times–bestselling author of Irresistible “Full of insight into human character, von Hippel’s book provides a stimulating program for measuring success without material yardsticks.” —Kirkus Reviews
Download or read book From Sign to Symbol written by Joseph Newirth and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2018-03-20 with total page 175 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In From Sign to Symbol: Transformational Processes in Psychoanalysis, Psychotherapy, and Psychology, Joseph Newirth describes the evolution of the unconscious from the psychoanalytic concept that reflected Freud’s positivist focus on symptoms and repressed memories to the contemporary structure that uses symbols and metaphors to create meaning within intimate, intersubjective relationships. Newirth integrates psychoanalytic theory with cognitive, developmental, and neuropsychological theories, and he differentiates two broad therapeutic strategies: an asymmetrical strategy that utilizes the logic of consciousness and emphasizes the differentiation of person, place, time, and causality in the world of objects, and a symmetrical strategy that utilizes the logic of the unconscious in the world of emotional, intersubjective experience. He presents multiple approaches to the use of these symmetrical therapeutic strategies, including the use of humor, dreams, metaphors, and implicit procedural learning, in transforming concrete symptoms and signs into the symbolic organizations of meaning. Examples from both psychotherapeutic practice and supervision are presented to illustrate the development of the capacity for symbolic thought or mentalization.
Download or read book Gross National Happiness written by Arthur C. Brooks and published by . This book was released on 2008-04-22 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author analyzes evidence and empirical research to determine which groups are the happiest in America; and offers suggestions on how the government can help individuals maximize their happiness.
Download or read book The Federalist Society written by Michael Avery and published by Vanderbilt University Press. This book was released on 2021-04-30 with total page 503 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the last thirty years, the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies has grown from a small group of disaffected conservative law students into an organization with extraordinary influence over American law and politics. Although the organization is unknown to the average citizen, this group of intellectuals has managed to monopolize the selection of federal judges, take over the Department of Justice, and control legal policy in the White House. Today the Society claims that 45,000 conservative lawyers and law students are involved in its activities. Four Supreme Court Justices--Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, John Roberts, and Samuel Alito--are current or former members. Every single federal judge appointed in the two Bush presidencies was either a Society member or approved by members. During the Bush years, young Federalist Society lawyers dominated the legal staffs of the Justice Department and other important government agencies. The Society has lawyer chapters in every major city in the United States and student chapters in every accredited law school. Its membership includes economic conservatives, social conservatives, Christian conservatives, and libertarians, who differ with each other on significant issues, but who cooperate in advancing a broad conservative agenda. How did this happen? How did this group of conservatives succeed in moving their theories into the mainstream of legal thought? What is the range of positions of those associated with the Federalist Society in areas of legal and political controversy? The authors survey these stances in separate chapters on • regulation of business and private property • race and gender discrimination and affirmative action • personal sexual autonomy, including abortion and gay rights • American exceptionalism and international law
Download or read book Sweetness and Power written by Sidney W. Mintz and published by Penguin. This book was released on 1986-08-05 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating persuasive history of how sugar has shaped the world, from European colonies to our modern diets In this eye-opening study, Sidney Mintz shows how Europeans and Americans transformed sugar from a rare foreign luxury to a commonplace necessity of modern life, and how it changed the history of capitalism and industry. He discusses the production and consumption of sugar, and reveals how closely interwoven are sugar's origins as a "slave" crop grown in Europe's tropical colonies with is use first as an extravagant luxury for the aristocracy, then as a staple of the diet of the new industrial proletariat. Finally, he considers how sugar has altered work patterns, eating habits, and our diet in modern times. "Like sugar, Mintz is persuasive, and his detailed history is a real treat." -San Francisco Chronicle
Download or read book Work Happiness and Unhappiness written by Peter Warr and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 2011-01-25 with total page 539 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Award-winning psychologist Peter Warr explores why some people at work are happier or unhappier than others. He evaluates different approaches to the definition and assessment of happiness, and combines environmental and person-based themes to explain differences in people's experience. A framework of key job characteristics is linked to an account of primary mental processes, and those are set within a summary of demographic, cultural, and occupational patterns. Consequences of happiness or unhappiness for individuals and groups are also reviewed, as is recent literature on unemployment and retirement. Although primarily focusing on job situations, the book shows that processes of happiness are similar across settings of all kinds. It provides a uniquely comprehensive assessment of research published across the world. Initial chapters explore the several meanings of happiness and the ways in which those have been measured by psychologists. The construct includes pleasure, satisfaction and subjective well-being, and unhappiness has been studied in terms of dissatisfaction, strain, anxiety, and depression. The impacts of principal environmental features on these experiences are reviewed through an analogy with vitamins in relation to physical health—beneficial only up to a point. However, environmental effects are not fixed. Influences on happiness from within the person are examined in terms of principal thinking patterns, personality styles, and cultural backgrounds. Differences are explored between groups (men and women, older and younger people, employees who are full-time and part-time, and so on), and processes of person-environment fit are placed within an overall framework which emphasizes the impact of variations in personal salience. The book is written primarily for academic readers, including senior undergraduates, graduate students, teachers, and researchers in fields of Industrial/Organizational Psychology, Management, Human Resources, and Labor Studies. However, the topic's centrality in many professions makes it important also to a wider readership.
Download or read book Big Disconnect written by Giles Slade and published by Prometheus Books. This book was released on 2012-08-07 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Smart phones and social media sites may be contemporary fixations, but using technology to replace face-to-face interactions is not a new cultural phenomenon. Throughout our history, intimacy with machines has often supplanted mutual human connection. This book reveals how consumer technologies changed from analgesic devices that soothed the loneliness of a newly urban generation to prosthetic interfaces that act as substitutes for companionship in modern America. The history of this transformation helps explain why we use technology to mediate our connections with other human beings instead of seeking out face-to-face contact. Do electronic interfaces receive most of our attention to the detriment of real interpersonal communication? Why do sixty million Americans report that isolation and loneliness are major sources of unhappiness? The author provides many insights into our increasingly artificial relationships and a vision for how we can rediscover genuine community and human empathy.
