TRIGGERnometry - Dr Linda Papadopoulos on Trigger Warnings, Social Media & Mental Health

00:00:00.000 hello and welcome to trigonometry i'm francis foster i'm constantin kissin and this is a show

00:00:12.000 for you if you're sick of people arguing on the internet over subjects they know nothing about

00:00:16.880 at trigonometry we don't pretend to be the experts we ask the experts our fantastic expert guest

00:00:23.260 this week is a psychologist and author dr linda papadopoulos welcome to trigonometry thank you

00:00:28.360 for having me it's great to have you here and before we get started what we

00:00:40.680 always like to do is ask the the guests to tell the viewers a little bit about

00:00:43.680 how they are where they are who they are just a little bit of background to get

00:00:47.720 them to know you sure well I'm a psychologist I've I guess I've been

00:00:54.280 really lucky in that I got into psychology at a very young age and I've been able to kind of

00:01:00.060 follow sort of several passions around. My interests range from the mind-body connection,

00:01:06.480 so I did a lot of work on kind of psychoneuroimmunology and skin in the early days and I

00:01:11.200 went off and I did a lot of work kind of adjacent out on body image, the way that we look, how it

00:01:15.980 affects how we feel. That then led me into things like objectification, sexualization, so I did a

00:01:21.340 lot of work and policy work as well, kind of advising how the way that we portray each

00:01:27.520 other and understand those portrayals affects our judgments, the way that we behave. And

00:01:33.220 then I've also gotten to do, I guess, some really kind of perhaps less highbrow but really

00:01:39.900 interesting stuff. So I've done a lot of media work where I think it's been really lovely

00:01:43.880 being able to kind of take these concepts that you normally write about in academic

00:01:47.800 journals to the to the public so I've had you know several tv shows I've written for popular

00:01:52.540 magazines and as well as my academic books I've written lots of self-help books as well and you

00:01:57.240 have your own podcast as well as well which we'll talk about well actually before we started the

00:02:01.160 interview we sat down we hadn't met before we started chatting and it very quickly became

00:02:05.180 apparent that we are quite aligned in terms of what we often talk about with you and so let's

00:02:11.660 just get straight into it first of all one of the things you know this is called trigonometry

00:02:15.280 and we briefly mentioned that i was telling you the study that i saw that telling giving people

00:02:21.140 trigger warnings actually primes them to be to have a negative experience of whatever it is and

00:02:26.560 you're like yeah please please ask me about that on on the show so what what do you want to say to

00:02:30.680 us as a psychologist about that if you think of um one of the things that we do in cognitive therapy

00:02:35.940 right when someone comes in and says look this is happening to me and it's really bothering me

00:02:40.280 One of the things that we do is we look at erroneous thinking.

00:02:43.600 So if I've come in and I've said, you know, oh, you know, I don't like stripes.

00:02:48.000 It may be that you hear, well, Linda doesn't like me.

00:02:50.560 We'll talk about it later.

00:02:53.120 And, you know, or she's being offensive and she's being directly offensive.

00:02:57.100 Now, if you were having therapy, they'd be like, well, maybe it's just that Linda had a bad experience with stripes.

00:03:01.520 Maybe it's nothing personal.

00:03:02.540 Maybe before you kind of personalize this and become triggered by it, maybe you need to check out with Linda why she said that.

00:03:09.020 So in a lot of ways, these trigger warnings, in a lot of ways kind of priming people to be offended is the exact opposite of what we do in CBT, which is take a step back and reevaluate that thought, right?

00:03:22.340 If I'm going out of my way to find something to be offended about, then I will be.

00:03:27.900 And there's a value in being offended because if I'm offended, I can put myself in the role of someone who's a victim, then they need to take care of me.

00:03:34.600 I can get sort of some sort of I can get social points because I've called you out for being whatever, being unthoughtful, uncaring.

00:03:43.260 So there's a reason why this happens.

00:03:45.320 And I think one of the things that that I think we see a lot of these days with regards to to people feeling that vulnerability is precisely because I think a lot of young people grew up in a culture where their parents got rid of obstacles.

00:03:58.900 They were like snowplows. So they had a problem with the teacher.

00:04:01.760 They went and they spoke to a teacher on their behalf.

00:04:04.340 They, you know, they didn't like not being invited to a kid's party.

00:04:07.200 They'd complain and they'd speak to the mother and they'd been invited to the party.

00:04:10.180 A big part of dealing with life is having the resilience to come back and realize that

00:04:15.040 sometimes shit happens not because someone's out to get me, but because things happen.

00:04:20.820 And I have to find the strength to overcome these things.

00:04:22.920 So I just kind of feel that a lot of the way that we're talking about trigger warnings

00:04:26.780 and language being dangerous, basically de-skills people

00:04:31.220 from being able to cope with these things.

00:04:34.000 And I certainly wouldn't want that, you know, for my child

00:04:37.460 or any of the young people that I work with.

00:04:39.360 And do you think this behaviour is addictive,

00:04:41.160 that once you start and you cast yourself in the role of victim,

00:04:44.660 you get this attention, you think to yourself,

00:04:46.260 hang on, I quite enjoy this, whether consciously or subconsciously?

00:04:50.900 Well, I think there's a power in being seen and being heard.

00:04:58.040 And look, I think there are some genuine people that are victimized out there,

00:05:00.880 and I think it's important that we say that,

00:05:02.560 and I think they should be able to speak up and talk about it.

00:05:05.240 But I think intent's important, right?

00:05:07.100 If I bump into you, and I didn't mean to bump into you,

00:05:10.340 then surely that matters, right?

00:05:12.400 Now, the amount, you know, if you're really hurt, that matters too.

00:05:16.840 But the intent has to come into it.

00:05:18.680 And I kind of fear that it's very rarely about intent.

00:05:22.520 It's very rarely that I didn't notice you had the striped shirt on

00:05:25.220 before I said, I don't like striped shirt.

00:05:27.100 I keep going on the shirt. I'm sorry.

00:05:30.260 I always enjoy when your fashion sense gets destroyed.

00:05:34.040 That's always the best.

00:05:35.180 I did show this to my girlfriend yesterday

00:05:37.180 and she just looked at it and then walked out the room.

00:05:40.160 You know when you're trying to pet a cat and it's like, no, I'm out.

00:05:43.940 So there we go.

00:05:44.560 The moral of the story is listen to your girlfriend.

00:05:46.320 Yeah, and listen to her disapproval.

00:05:48.680 Right, do you think social media has made this worse,

00:05:51.820 the fact that, you know, we're all constantly logged in,

00:05:53.900 we're all looking for approval, we're all looking for likes,

00:05:56.320 et cetera, et cetera, et cetera?

00:05:57.780 I think it's a huge part of it.

00:06:00.420 I think, yes, they're looking for approval and likes,

00:06:02.480 but I think also kind of the distillation of one's ideology

00:06:06.260 down to their, you know, most thoughtless tweet, right?

00:06:09.620 So, you know, surely we're an amalgam of all of, you know,

00:06:14.860 the ways that we interact, our interactions, our opinions,

00:06:17.820 everything else but because i can look into your background and come up with the one time that you

00:06:22.840 used a you know whatever you know a word in the wrong way or you i re-liked something you didn't

00:06:28.340 think about and you retweeted it i think these things mean that um we're walking on eggshells

00:06:34.840 we're constantly so anxious of being misunderstood um because they're like we said earlier there's

00:06:41.380 there's something um in calling out people for being wrong so we've got this very weird situation

00:06:48.080 where we want to be seen so we're constantly kind of saying this is what i feel about this and i

00:06:51.840 have an opinion about that but at the same time the rest of us are kind of looking to call each

00:06:56.880 other out because there's a value in that as well so like the kind of the discourse isn't the

00:07:00.840 healthiest we're not kind of talking to get to a better place of understanding we're talking to

00:07:04.720 kind of call each other out and see well hold on maybe you didn't see that in the right way and

00:07:09.160 And then that, you know, and those kind of Twitter wars start.

00:07:12.140 And do you think it's sort of, it increases people's narcissism using the social media?

00:07:19.060 Well, I think it's inevitable that something that makes you think about how you're seen in such a nuanced way increases narcissism.

00:07:31.220 And I don't mean that, I mean, it's actually really kind of heartbreaking.

00:07:35.380 So I've been a psychologist for many, many years, and sort of even things that I see a lot of, the way they're depicted to me have changed.

00:07:41.760 I do a lot with eating disorders.

00:07:43.540 And, you know, for many years, the big thing was a number, right?

00:07:47.560 So I want to be this weight.

00:07:48.600 I want to be this size.

00:07:49.680 And then more recently, people are bringing in sort of pictures from Instagram with sort of hashtags like bikini bridge or thigh gap or box gap,

00:07:56.780 which means we're kind of standing outside ourselves and looking in.

00:08:00.540 We're kind of, you know, self-objectifying.

00:08:02.820 Now, this self-objectification, while there's a narcissistic element, there's also an element that kind of belies incredibly dangerous low self-esteem because, you know, not only am I looking at myself through my eyes, but through the eyes of, you know, everyone else that I feel is looking at me and through their values and through the way that they're going to assess me.

00:08:21.940 So yeah, I always say if I was going to create an exercise for poor self-esteem, I'd tell

00:08:27.580 people to take a bunch of pictures of themselves, look through the ones that are like the least

00:08:31.720 awful, then find that one and then spend, you know, 20 minutes filtering it, thinking

00:08:36.260 of a great hashtag, then put it up on social media, then sit back and wait for the likes

00:08:40.100 and if 50 don't come in the first 20 minutes, take it down and start over again.

00:08:43.780 That is literally an exercise in, you know, in poor self-esteem.

00:08:47.620 And yet, you know, so many people do it day in, day out.

00:08:51.480 And this idea of not being able to live up to your selfie, you know, this discrepancy

00:08:56.400 between who I am and who I'm projecting, I think is having a significant effect on mental

00:09:02.920 health because there's no ability to rest from what does everybody else think about

00:09:08.300 me.

00:09:08.800 That's constantly there.

00:09:10.280 There's no ability to just say, well, this is who I am and maybe this can be OK.

00:09:14.120 And I've always thought as well that kind of part of your job as a human being is you

00:09:17.600 mature is to start to get to a point where your self-esteem is driven by what you think about

00:09:23.080 yourself, like a kind of sense of who you are. And it seems like social media is taking that away

00:09:28.480 from us and kind of almost exploring our vulnerabilities as human beings. Would you

00:09:32.780 say that we're particularly vulnerable to social media as humans? Well, this is such an interesting

00:09:37.560 point. So again, if you look at sort of human evolution, we've not evolved to kind of absorb

00:09:44.180 the opinions of thousands and thousands of people on ourselves right we tend to live in sort of in

00:09:49.340 groups and and there's some research that attests the fact that even the amount of forensic we have

00:09:53.460 should be no more than about a hundred we just can't handle anymore that's how we've evolved

00:09:57.380 it works well so social media is all about the numbers like you say and so you know being able

00:10:04.100 to assimilate this kind of I mean there's like bathroom doors anyone can write whatever it is

00:10:08.880 on the back but because they're not in a little cubicle with a smelly toilet they're there for

00:10:13.020 everyone to see. It matters. Whatever's written matters. And if thousands and thousands of people's

00:10:19.540 opinions and the diversity of them matter, again, that's a recipe for disaster because not only do

00:10:26.200 you not rest from it, but you're never, like you say, able to say, do you know what? This is who I

00:10:30.780 am. This is the imperfect version of who I am. And while I think we all want to, you know,

00:10:34.840 self-actualize and reach our potential, you know, part of that is saying, I'll never play in the

00:10:40.360 mba if i'm a certain height or i'll never have a singing career if i can't and whatever it is

00:10:44.660 and and being okay with that and i think that's that's harder when you know those goal posts are

00:10:50.220 always you know sort of changing about who you ought to be and everyone's telling you well you're

00:10:54.160 not there yet what what do you think about what do you think makes social media so addictive

00:10:58.800 what is it specifically has they designed it that way why do we buy into it so much like even i do

00:11:06.080 it even i do the first thing i do when i wake up in the morning is check instagram yeah because

00:11:11.820 okay this is very interesting again so up until relatively recently psychology has been used to

00:11:18.580 help people right so you have a problem you go to psychologists you help them um in the last sort of

00:11:23.340 20 30 years psychology is slowly being used to to persuade people there's there's places called

00:11:30.000 sort of persuasive technology labs, usually where, you know, places where tech exists, right? So like

00:11:36.520 Silicon Valley, where our psychology is being used against us. So for example, I don't know,

00:11:43.020 you guys obviously Netflix, right? I love Netflix. I can't watch one show anymore. I rarely, if I'm

00:11:48.100 watching a series, I can rarely turn off and watch. Now, the reason for that is they know that if they

00:11:54.200 start the next one right away, like they do, I'm more likely to stay. They take away a barrier. If

00:11:58.380 If I can skip the intro, I'm more likely to stay.

00:12:00.580 They take away another barrier because the metric for the success of social media sites

00:12:04.920 is time spent online.

00:12:06.920 So they ensure, and not because they're evil, I don't think anyone with these social media

00:12:10.560 companies is bad or evil, they're just trying to maximize their profit, maximize how successful

00:12:16.040 they are.

00:12:17.040 So if time spent online is what they want, when I'm devising whatever, Instagram, Snapchat,

00:12:22.380 Facebook, I'm going to ensure, well, what will make you more likely to stay?

00:12:26.360 I know that notifications will. Why? You know there's something called variable

00:12:31.520 reward system. You know like slot machines? Yeah. You know why they're

00:12:34.940 addictive? If every time you pulled it you know something would come out there'd

00:12:38.540 be not much to it. You'd get it when you wanted it but the fact that sometimes it

00:12:41.660 comes out every three times you pull it, sometimes it comes out every five times

00:12:44.660 means you're much more likely to go back. We know that. That's very basic human

00:12:48.200 behavior. Now that variable reward system exists on all social media sites. It

00:12:53.000 It exists when you see that little notification at the bottom.

00:12:56.560 It exists when you're going to get some sort of validation, when you get the retweet.

00:13:00.660 It exists when someone likes something.

00:13:02.760 We know that.

00:13:03.760 Now, also, there's gender differences here, right?

00:13:06.020 So if we look at the way that boys and girls react differently, we know that boys tend

00:13:11.400 to be much more apt to gaming addiction.

00:13:14.140 Why is that?

00:13:15.260 Because from an evolutionary perspective, men have evolved to seek out competency, especially

00:13:20.460 during those teen years, young boys.

00:13:22.320 Now, what does that mean?

00:13:23.400 That means I want to feel like I'm getting good at something.

00:13:26.160 Now, what better thing than if I give you a game

00:13:28.320 that I kind of ding, ding, ding, give you a reward

00:13:30.300 every little while, every little increment so I feel better

00:13:32.720 and I get that dopamine rush and I play more,

00:13:35.000 so I get more of a dopamine rush.

00:13:36.500 So that becomes quite addictive.

00:13:38.700 For girls, we're taught to seek out

00:13:40.980 kind of that social equity, right?

00:13:43.000 Do you like me?

00:13:44.060 Do I have that equity?

00:13:45.440 Do you enjoy being with me?

00:13:47.800 And as a consequence, again, those hearts, those likes

00:13:50.620 are going to be very validating and rewarding so you know behind your phone this is not just a

00:13:56.660 platform there's you know there's dozens of people with phds in psychology you know way smarter than

00:14:02.400 you know than the average person in terms of how they understand human behavior how they understand

00:14:07.480 themselves all you know ensuring that you spend as much time as possible on these platforms and

00:14:13.200 do you think that there's anything that can be done or what what what's going to be the impact

00:14:17.020 first of all of this if you project it into the future and is there anything we can do as a society

00:14:22.800 maybe legislatively to start to curb some of these things? Yeah I mean I think it will I think we're

00:14:29.320 already beginning to see so sort of gaming addictions already accepted in places like Japan

00:14:35.100 not yet in the States but I think it's happening we know that. We know that again even from a

00:14:44.160 psychological point of view um you know self-harm um which we we tend to see quite a lot of it

00:14:51.420 especially with sort of adolescents young adults we're beginning to see that in the digital form

00:14:55.760 so digital self-harm where young people are bullying themselves online anonymously now this

00:15:01.220 is a new thing and what yeah you've got to tell us more about i've never heard of this so um

00:15:07.380 there's been cases where um young people have been horrifically bullied online and as we know

00:15:13.660 there's been you know horrific cases where they've taken their own lives or attempted to

00:15:16.800 and what we find now is in some cases certainly certainly not all but in some cases these young

00:15:22.360 people will actually be in such a low place that they create another profile and they bully

00:15:26.100 themselves they call themselves stupid or ugly or horrible and the premise we believe because this

00:15:32.000 is very new this is not something we know uh you know we don't have much data on but we believe

00:15:37.220 it's the same thing. It's about showing the pain, showing the pain I feel inside and externalizing

00:15:45.680 it and being able to deal with it. So all of these things are affecting us. And this is just

00:15:51.920 mental health. Cognitive health is being affected as well. We know that millennials now, there's

00:15:56.440 some studies to attest to the fact that millennials have worse memories than seniors. And we know

00:16:01.420 that because when you consolidate a memory, if you keep being interrupted, you're never going

00:16:06.240 to consolidate that memory so try and remember something when I keep you know you keep hearing

00:16:10.760 buzzing or pinging you're having to re-answer that email there's a reason for this sleep

00:16:14.900 disorders huge problem they're on the rise why because this blue light that we're constantly on

00:16:20.360 affects us sleep's really important we believe that sleep is one of the factors that is implicated

00:16:25.460 in depression so there's so much going on and and I think kind of our tech has outpaced our

00:16:32.900 social evolution our physiological evolution and we're trying to play catch up and what

00:16:38.700 responsibility do the social media companies have for our mental health do i mean is it simply the

00:16:44.840 fact that you know we're all individuals and you know we need to be responsible for ourselves or

00:16:49.860 do they need to take some responsibility for essentially manipulating us and in getting us

00:16:55.080 to engage in this addictive behavior i think i think you know they they do need to take some

00:17:00.340 responsibility um you know it can't be that everywhere else we have regulation like the ads

00:17:06.320 that kids see you know the watershed you remember the watershed that was a thing you know completely

00:17:11.320 irrelevant now but there was a reason we had the watershed right um so yeah some responsibility

00:17:17.240 needs to be taken i think the problem is is that um the way that our our governments are set up to

00:17:24.300 to kind of regulate these things often doesn't apply when you don't understand because of the

00:17:29.200 where these companies are set up, you know, not just where they're domiciled, but what they

00:17:32.320 actually do. Well, I'm a publishing company. I just let people put videos on my site, you know,

00:17:36.280 so it's all this kind of, well, what do you actually do though? If you're, if you're not

00:17:39.920 taking, you know, these videos are dangerous, whose responsibility is it? Is it you for providing

00:17:43.660 the platform or is it the person putting up? So we need to have some serious conversations about

00:17:48.160 this. I think government needs to come in with some sort of better guidelines about usage for

00:17:52.720 young people, especially for kids. And we are slowly getting more information, but again,

00:17:57.320 you guys need to remember is sort of you know what Facebook's a teenager you know Snapchat's

00:18:01.540 what seven eight years old Instagram nine ten you know these are all new so we're kind of trying to

00:18:06.260 figure it out but I don't think it's good enough saying you know well you know the internet's the

00:18:10.200 one place where you're allowed to have no legislation or no restrictions you know it

00:18:14.700 seems ridiculous to me that in every other area of our lives we have at least some semblance of

00:18:19.680 guidance. The one thing that I notice with social media is from my days as a

00:18:25.740 teacher is year on year seeing children being less adept at social interaction

00:18:31.440 and obviously I've never done a study on it but I just always thought and then

00:18:36.040 you saw them the moment you gave their phones back at the end of the day because

00:18:38.760 we took the phones off from at the start they were 10 11 the moment they first

00:18:42.060 they do switch on going whatever it is and but you saw a lot of the time that

00:18:46.260 Arguments would happen in a playground, not because there was antagonism, not because there was a bullying issue at times.

00:18:55.480 It was simply because they didn't know how to articulate their thoughts and listen to one another.

00:19:01.560 And I found that terrifying.

00:19:03.380 Because it's practice, right?

00:19:05.180 That's how we learn.

00:19:06.760 We learn to read each other and speak, and the nuances of voice inflection, everything.

00:19:12.080 It's practice.

00:19:12.880 when you don't have that you know of course it's going to be anxiety provoking and we know

00:19:17.800 that you know with any anything in life the more you avoid the bigger the problem becomes if I'm

00:19:23.660 afraid of social gatherings and I stop going to them eventually you know it's hard to get out of

00:19:28.900 my front door at some point because I've avoided avoided and likewise with communication so I

00:19:33.360 think we definitely need to foster that you know and I think the other thing that you speak about

00:19:37.960 young people I have such an issue with kind of the age segregation that happens right so that you

00:19:42.680 know, the 14-year-olds just speak with other 14-year-olds, the millennials just with the

00:19:46.060 millennials. There's something important with, you know, the quirky aunt or the funny grandma

00:19:51.020 that you hung out with, you know, where we had that. And I think now, again, because of these

00:19:55.280 connections, which are wonderful in a lot of ways that we can have friends around the world,

00:19:58.800 but I can literally, you know, be so isolated and have these quote-unquote echo chambers,

00:20:04.360 not just in terms of political views, but also in terms of the uniformity of the people I choose

00:20:09.100 to speak with and that in and of itself is dangerous because the young people you're worried

00:20:13.020 about are speaking about with other young people who are absolutely fine talking like that so you're

00:20:16.740 the one that's kind of a bit odd what are you worried about you know everyone else I speak to

00:20:21.140 is fine right so this suddenly reminds me of my own school days thank you

00:20:24.660 well well lindy you mentioned a little bit about boys and girls and how they think differently and

00:20:40.860 do to focus on different things there's no difference mate stop it there we there we go

00:20:45.360 that's exactly where i was going to take this because even the concept now that there's a

00:20:49.420 difference between men and women is becoming a triggering issue for a certain group of society

00:20:55.180 you're someone who's worked in in helping couples and things like that right so can you tell us a

00:21:00.700 little bit about what are the main differences between men and women psychologically and how

00:21:05.060 that manifests particularly with respect to relationships i think we're still look there

00:21:10.260 there's physiological differences right so the fact that there's a y chromosome means something

00:21:14.820 we know that men are significantly over-represented in prisons right um we know uh sort of that that

00:21:22.120 you know aggression tends to you know or the display of it we know that men commit suicide

00:21:27.200 more than women even the women present with with depression more um now that might be the way that

00:21:32.800 men are socialized again one of my my biggest pet peeves is that we we still i think we're getting

00:21:37.780 somewhere you know somewhat better but i think we still make more space for for you know women's

00:21:42.380 mental health than men's mental health i think men still feel more stigmatized it's easier to

00:21:46.480 show anger than sadness um i think um the social norms around what's expected of men and women

00:21:53.400 although we're trying to battle some of them still remain i've got a you know a wonderful friend who

00:21:59.160 uh decided his wife makes more money than him wanted to stay home and take care of the kids

00:22:04.380 he stayed home he's always making jokes about you know how the other dads are afraid of them

00:22:08.120 don't know what to say to him you're just like this weird guy that stays home we're not sure

00:22:11.040 so you know you know there are there differences around biology yes around expectations yes around

00:22:17.980 sort of you know uh our chromosomes you know our hormones and make us difference of course they do

00:22:23.500 now you know i understand that there's always a fear in talking about difference because immediately

00:22:28.480 once you talk about difference the fear is then are you going to use my difference you know against

00:22:32.180 me so i understand you know where that comes from but i think it's more dangerous to be intellectually

00:22:37.660 dishonest and not talk about difference and not have the conversations that matter to ensure that

00:22:44.780 both men and women are treated as fairly as possible, you know, within the realms of what

00:22:50.600 it means to be, you know, a person living in 2018 today, kind of navigating all these things.

00:22:55.940 Well, look, even in relationships, I mean, I've been married for 14 years now. We've had, you know,

00:22:59.740 ups and downs, as you always do. And one of the biggest differences in terms of kind of

00:23:04.660 helping our relationship forward was reading men are from mars women are from venus that's

00:23:08.480 spoke by john gray i'm sure there's different people who have different disagreements about

00:23:12.300 particular things about it but one of the things it was very helpful in is helping me understand

00:23:17.000 my wife but also in helping me understand myself and understand why i'm doing certain things or

00:23:22.860 why i'm feeling certain things and i think that's a potentially very big danger if you tell me if

00:23:27.180 you tell people there's no difference between men and women when there actually are differences then

00:23:31.700 And that makes relationships more difficult, doesn't it?

00:23:34.300 Well, yeah.

00:23:35.000 I mean, look, I think self-awareness is key, right?

00:23:38.400 Understanding why you behave the way you behave.

00:23:40.940 And look, psychologists talk about a biopsychosocial approach.

00:23:45.220 So we need to look at, you know, are there biological restraint?

00:23:48.140 You know, does the fact that you have sort of a different hormonal chemistry than your wife,

00:23:55.200 will that make you process things different?

00:23:57.000 You know, if so, how?

00:23:58.460 does the fact

00:24:00.460 sociology does the fact that you've been

00:24:02.640 socialized differently mean that you're going to

00:24:04.700 view something differently to your wife perhaps

00:24:06.800 if so how psychology

00:24:08.860 now is this different is this is there

00:24:10.700 something within your psychology

00:24:12.460 you know maybe there is maybe there isn't but again

00:24:14.800 I think there's something very important

00:24:16.660 about not being afraid to kind

00:24:18.720 of just sort of look at the good signs

00:24:20.740 that's out there and not

00:24:22.900 fall prey and again look

00:24:24.800 I know it comes from a good place and you know

00:24:26.840 people you know absolutely who have been oppressed whatever group sort of you know should absolutely

00:24:31.560 be able to fight for their rights and and you know and we should all support them but i think

00:24:37.560 that can't happen to the detriment of what we know for sure so pretending that you know biology

00:24:45.420 doesn't matter is i think it's it's it's not a fair or accurate statement do you think there's

00:24:52.720 In intellectual circles, there's this dishonesty happening

00:24:57.980 where people feel that they have to parrot a certain viewpoint

00:25:01.900 because if they don't, they could be seen to be, in inverted commas,

00:25:06.680 a bigot or whatever else.

00:25:09.280 Have you ever felt that pressure in your career?

00:25:12.580 Look, I try and be honest with what I believe.

00:25:17.040 I do. I try and substantiate what I say.

00:25:19.360 I think that's very important because I think when you have science behind you

00:25:23.480 and you say what you say, then it's easier.

00:25:25.520 Having said that, I think people will often hear what they want to hear.

00:25:29.260 You know, and, you know, one worries if, I think, again, because of social media,

00:25:35.320 because of, you know, this, you know, this kind of caricaturization of each other

00:25:40.580 when we don't believe in each other, right?

00:25:41.920 So I take this one thing you've said and I've turned you into this caricature

00:25:45.040 of the one thing, it doesn't help.

00:25:46.900 And I think people become afraid, because unless you have a forum where you can sit down and discuss in sort of long form what you mean, then it becomes dangerous.

00:25:54.820 And I think that's precisely why podcasts like this do quite well, because I think you have enough time to have a proper detailed discussion about what you mean.

00:26:04.460 Whereas I think the rest of the time we're trying to do this in 160 characters or less, and you simply can't.

00:26:09.120 You can't get to the essence and the nuance and the difficulties with these discussions in forums like that.

00:26:14.600 and even something like this actually i mean youtube if you go on youtube on the youtube

00:26:18.900 after when we put this episode out you will see that there are some people who absolutely go for

00:26:23.980 it in that way they will listen to the hour they will go well 40 minutes was really interesting

00:26:28.400 but this thing i really didn't agree with or whatever which is great right but there will

00:26:32.560 also be people now i think who are so trained in that kind of twitter mentality that they will go

00:26:37.360 they will listen to one minute and then they will pick something they don't like and then comment

00:26:41.700 about that and not watch the rest of the conversation i think that's scary well it's

00:26:46.740 not only scary it's it's again it's intellectually dishonest it's bad science you know you can't take

00:26:54.020 you know something out of context you know and again i kind of go back sort of the way that you

00:26:59.000 see people clinically you know one of the things when you know when i work with someone that's

00:27:01.980 depressed i say one of the things that a depressive mind does is it looks for things to be sad about

00:27:06.520 so you're going to look at news stories that are sad you're going to look at something that's going

00:27:09.000 on in the street that makes you sad you selectively find it if you're looking for something to be

00:27:13.980 offended by if you're looking that's again that's that's that's not the healthiest way to to relate

00:27:20.100 to the world around you you know you need to look at things in you know in the wider context look at

00:27:25.220 what was being discussed and then make you know make that assumption and where do you think this

00:27:28.960 comes from sorry francis where do you think this increased vulnerability increased kind of pursuit

00:27:33.780 of victimhood almost where do you think that comes from um i think i think partly um because

00:27:43.620 so many obstacles i think were kind of taken away from young people i think there is this fear i

00:27:48.980 think there's a genuine fear that i won't be able to cope if you say something i don't like i won't

00:27:53.160 be able to cope because i've not had to before so i think people aren't used to it i think also

00:27:58.280 so that there's value in it, that they get something.

00:28:01.780 So, you know, being in the sick role, whatever that means,

00:28:04.700 means that, you know, you're going to be taken care of,

00:28:06.560 there's going to be special things put around you.

00:28:08.160 I also think that, again, if we look at the research on this,

00:28:11.560 so there's all this research that this is increasing in university campuses.

00:28:14.740 Actually, it's not so much, it hasn't really increased.

00:28:17.600 What's happened is that people are pandering to the minority more.

00:28:20.880 That's what's happened.

00:28:21.720 So on university campuses where we see since I think about 2013,

00:28:25.000 we've been seeing this whole kind of trigger warning.

00:28:27.480 I know we can't have free speech.

00:28:29.320 I think what's happened is you've seen sort of university administrators kind of take over and pander to the loudest, most offended voice.

00:28:37.000 So, you know, I think sometimes we're misrepresenting sort of younger people and millennials, you know, as being this kind of, oh, they're these terrible snowflakes.

00:28:44.980 I just think what's, you know, what's happening is that the minorities that get offended extremely easily and want to shut down conversation, have that, have been given, you know, much bigger forms to be able to do this.

00:28:57.120 And there's some literature to attest to that.

00:28:58.900 There is actually a reason for that, which is that the faculty has become far more culturally left-leaning over the years.

00:29:05.100 So the ratio used to be in the 60s, it would be like one conservative for like 10 liberals.

00:29:11.780 And now it's like one for 300.

00:29:14.640 Yeah.

00:29:15.460 We have a guy coming in to speak to us called Eric Kaufman.

00:29:18.980 He was a professor of politics later.

00:29:21.320 And there's something he talks about in his book, just how that has changed over time.

00:29:27.120 And also universities, they're self-selective as well.

00:29:29.420 It's something that people, Jonathan Haidt talks about this,

00:29:31.780 is people who go to university are liberal anyway.

00:29:34.100 And then if you've got basically all very liberal professors,

00:29:37.420 that will happen and that minority is being pandered to.

00:29:40.200 And I think one of the things that Jonathan Haidt speaks about a lot as well

00:29:42.560 is this idea that we need some diversity of thought, you know,

00:29:45.660 this heterogeneity, because, you know,

00:29:48.160 if we're just bouncing off and saying the same things over and over again,

00:29:51.100 you know, obviously it's going to amplify that one, you know,

00:29:53.980 one idea or one notion.

00:29:55.560 we all seem to want diversity in more and more from what I can see and we just we're talking

00:30:02.860 about diversity but we don't seem to want diversity of thought especially diversity

00:30:07.120 that challenges our own opinions because what seems to happen at this point is shutting down

00:30:12.760 no you're wrong let's smear you as whatever x y and zed yeah yeah and and it's something to be

00:30:19.900 really rightfully afraid of you know I think a lot of people fear that because it's just easier

00:30:27.600 to not do your homework and assume that that person said that thing and because these ideas

00:30:31.600 spread so quickly people are much more likely as you said earlier to kind of think well do you know

00:30:36.560 what maybe it's better if we don't but then you have to ask yourself the question well what happens

00:30:40.860 if we continue not to you know isn't it precisely the thing that we fear the most this idea of you

00:30:46.800 know big brother of someone watching you you know we're watching each other now this is like you

00:30:52.460 know and that's kind of the really worrying thing that we're watching each other to catch each other

00:30:56.660 out to tell on each other that doesn't make for like a happy society right and it's fine if you're

00:31:03.100 you know if we if we disagree if you're like well you know you got this wrong do you know about this

00:31:06.540 but i need you know to enter into with the idea that we're not all coming from a place of being

00:31:10.760 bad people you know we're all trying to trying to get to a better place of understanding when i you

00:31:15.340 know, when I work with couples, I always say, look, if you have an argument, you know, move

00:31:19.200 it from between you and put it in front of you and sit down and try and figure it out

00:31:22.340 together. It's one of the best techniques, you know, to do that. And the whole point

00:31:25.320 of an argument is not to win it. It's to get to a better place of understanding. If we

00:31:29.440 approach these political arguments like that, that I'm not trying to, you know, turning

00:31:33.120 into left and right and, you know, Democrat and Republican. Yeah.

00:31:39.140 A bit of orange face popped into my head there and I got all confused. You know, instead

00:31:43.900 if we were trying to have you know proper discussions about understanding each other

00:31:47.800 better without calling each other names and vilifying each other then maybe we'd get somewhere

00:31:52.780 but you know very sadly I think you know you see too many times it turns into this name calling

00:31:58.960 and that just that doesn't help at all I think that's where the social media comes into because

00:32:03.080 so many times I can I used to have arguments with people on Facebook all the time about politics and

00:32:08.980 and all this kind of thing, and I've really stopped.

00:32:10.480 But when I used to, I'd talk to that person online

00:32:14.200 and we'd have a disagreement and they wouldn't go anywhere.

00:32:17.860 And the next time I saw that person in person,

00:32:21.460 we could have a conversation.

00:32:23.680 And sometimes you find out you don't even have a disagreement.

00:32:28.280 And that, to me, is a big indicator.

00:32:30.880 But, I mean, increasingly, that's how we communicate.

00:32:33.320 But what Constantine is trying to say with that

00:32:35.480 is that he's a massive troll, Linda.

00:32:37.060 oh yeah definitely definitely but but that face-to-face communicate what is it about

00:32:42.840 face-to-face communication that makes us more able to have the conversation because face-to-face is

00:32:50.220 not you know people think that verbal communication is about what's being said that's a small

00:32:54.140 proportion of it it's about body language it's about inflection of voice it's about you know

00:32:58.760 i know when you're ready to speak it's you know think about when we're speaking right you know

00:33:03.080 when i'm about to finish and you know when to come in we don't say it to each other but we just

00:33:06.360 it's that that rhythm now all of this together right the context the body language the inflection

00:33:11.720 all these nuances means that you get a lot more so if i'm if you were to say to me don't be

00:33:15.460 ridiculous linda looking at me and speaking i could get take it as a joke if you tweet me you're

00:33:20.020 being ridiculous or don't be ridiculous i don't see you kind of smiling i don't see that in the

00:33:24.420 you know in the backdrop of we've had this great conversation so automatically we know without all

00:33:28.840 that context i can take it differently and again we've had you know i have this great slide that

00:33:34.680 show this talk that i do there's about kind of there's something called um ultimate i think is

00:33:40.840 it ultimate social penetration something like that so it's about 50 million users right when

00:33:44.520 something reaches 50 million users i think the radio took something like 38 years and i think

00:33:49.080 the tv took 20 years and i think you know you go lower and lower so the you know the the internet

00:33:55.000 took you know five years and mobile phones took three years and angry birds took 35 days

00:33:59.800 you gotta remember that you know these are all different ways of communicating so through the

00:34:07.020 radio we had this great big span of time the tv phones you know you know all of a sudden not only

00:34:13.560 am i not seeing you i'm trying to figure out you know what what these emojis mean you know you're

00:34:17.900 sending me various you know faces and and i'm trying to figure those out it's it's not something

00:34:23.100 that happens you know overnight and yet it feels like it it has and i think we're still playing

00:34:28.600 catch up and so that's why communication is so much harder in some ways. I also think it's about

00:34:32.460 threat of force. If you're talking to someone face to face, some of the stuff that people will

00:34:36.520 say to us online, they would never say that to your face because they'd probably get punched in

00:34:41.000 the face. It's like being inside a car. You scream at people all the time when you're inside your car

00:34:45.340 and then you would never, someone like, bumped into you on the road, you wouldn't be like,

00:34:49.200 what the hell are you doing? You'd be like, oh, sorry, go ahead. By all means, why do we do it?

00:34:53.360 It's the same thing. We feel protected. We feel so, yeah. But isn't it also as well that we carry

00:34:58.100 around this latent anger with us. Speak for yourself, mate. You two can have a session of

00:35:04.320 psychotherapy just right now. I'll just sit and watch. But, you know, we get frustrated at things

00:35:09.940 that happen to our lives. We get resentments. We get, and all of a sudden, somebody says something

00:35:14.340 online, you're like, or in your car. And it's just a way of venting, of projecting, it's a release

00:35:20.220 valve, isn't it, really? Yeah, yeah, it's a release valve. I don't have to see how much I've upset

00:35:25.360 you i can then turn it off and go make a cup of tea and forget about it you know and it becomes

00:35:30.880 you know a way of lashing out with no consequence or potentially no consequence so yeah i think it

00:35:36.640 is i think it's a really ineffective one um i don't think you know people should construe that

00:35:40.660 as an effective way because i you know these things you know thoughts aren't intangible things

00:35:44.700 you know you think enough negative stuff of course it affects you we know now psychophysiologically

00:35:49.640 it affects you so I think you know people that that carry around that much anger and and hurt

00:35:55.340 and stuff you know kind of venting it and putting it out there is is not a way of properly dealing

00:36:01.020 with it while it might in the short term feel like a vent you know it's the stuff still there

00:36:05.720 so on a serious note you know if people you know people really need to look at themselves if they're

00:36:09.640 doing that all right well let's wrap up the social media section with a positive message so

00:36:14.040 if you were to give some advice to people who feel like maybe social media usage is starting

00:36:18.760 to become a problem for them uh what what can people do to kind of wean themselves off that

00:36:23.420 um you know i i think i think you need to understand social media is a press release right

00:36:29.780 it's sort of their press release is about our lives and we all do it so um there's all this

00:36:34.960 really interesting research that we post when we're on a high and we surf when we're on a low

00:36:38.460 right so we post when we're out in michelin star restaurant and we surf when we're eating leftovers

00:36:43.020 so remember that so you know read it as a press release these are the superlatives of each other's

00:36:48.300 lives try and use it to connect but also remember that the proper connections that you make

00:36:53.500 actually you know they don't care you know about what you're reading what you're wearing what's

00:36:58.600 going on so I've kind of this you know these proper the things that nourish us nourish us

00:37:04.280 the most you know in terms of humor interactions don't have to do with people liking us if they

00:37:09.700 have to do with people liking us because just because right so posture those relationships

00:37:14.600 use it you know you know for fun but i certainly wouldn't say don't base your self-esteem on it

00:37:19.240 and certainly don't base you know this sense of self-worth on it either

00:37:22.360 you've done a lot of work linda moving on um with the how our mental health is reflected in our skin

00:37:37.760 and the way we are would you be able to expand on that a little bit sure so um

00:37:42.600 So the skin and the central nervous system are actually really closely related.

00:37:48.640 They develop out of the same stuff embryologically, the ectoderm,

00:37:51.600 which means that many times we see that our stress levels, the way that we feel,

00:37:57.260 kind of manifest in skin conditions if we have a predisposition to them.

00:38:00.480 And this is something that I studied for quite a while,

00:38:04.560 and I looked at the extent to which our emotions affect the onset and progression of different conditions.

00:38:11.980 and we found that they very much do i kind of think that um you know again going back you know

00:38:18.180 our thoughts aren't intangible things if i sit around feeling very stressed and very anxious

00:38:23.000 a lot of things are going to happen in my body physiologically so i don't let's give the example

00:38:27.420 of a pimple right you get a pimple right before the big day that you're waiting for right before

00:38:31.920 the date or right before the you know the big interview what happens we know that when you get

00:38:37.840 stressed, your cortisol rises. We also know that testosterone is likely to rise when you get

00:38:43.160 stressed. When testosterone rises, we know that sebum production rises. We know when sebum

00:38:48.160 production rises, you're much more likely to get a clogged pore and boom, you get a pimple on the

00:38:52.100 big day. So there's a way of understanding how your skin reacts to stress. And if you can clock

00:38:57.760 it, if you can clock how your stress affects the way that your skin develops and the health of

00:39:03.660 your skin then you can work towards making it better so we did a study years ago my actually

00:39:09.420 got into this because my cousin had vitiligo and she struggled with it for for years and we looked

00:39:14.720 at vitiligo and and we were able to to have significant reduction through talking therapies

00:39:21.180 right so either this it would cease or there would be a reduction and these talking therapies it was

00:39:25.420 cbt was a cbt protocol that basically looked at how to deal with stressful life situations and

00:39:31.660 And since then, some of my amazing doctoral students who now have positions in dermatology

00:39:37.300 units are doing brilliantly.

00:39:39.800 Waiting times are dermatology units are falling because so much of the way that our skin,

00:39:45.100 the way that it functions has to do with what's going on in our minds.

00:39:48.420 But also, what goes on in our minds has to do with how our skin looks.

00:39:51.860 Remember, if you have a skin disease, people feel that they're able to ask.

00:39:55.760 If you're walking around with an ulcer, no one can see it.

00:39:57.860 If you're walking around with some eczema, people will ask you, what's that?

00:40:00.280 Or they'll look at it.

00:40:00.980 or they'll be kind of anxious to take something from your hand.

00:40:03.460 That has an effect on you.

00:40:05.180 So being able to mitigate those effects by using good, you know, techniques,

00:40:10.000 psychological techniques, really helps, we've found.

00:40:12.920 Why do... Why do... Why is it that whenever I get stressed, I get eczema?

00:40:17.520 Immediately, that's the first thing, and it's always the same place.

00:40:20.640 It's always the back of the legs, and it's just a disc, and I can feel it.

00:40:23.700 The moment I get anxious, it starts with the itching,

00:40:26.260 and then before I know it, there's a flare-up.

00:40:28.000 and again so you have your bone the predisposition to eczema and the stress ensures that the kind of

00:40:34.440 the mechanisms through which that eczema comes about are triggered right so what would be really

00:40:39.060 useful for you is if you know that something is coming on so you know if you can understand why

00:40:44.140 that stress is coming on is it work is it you know too much on your plate concentrate

00:40:47.980 is it constant i know when i'm succeeding when he's got excellent we have to hoover

00:40:55.400 but you know what would be really great rather than waiting till it gets there on a serious

00:41:00.820 notice to kind of say okay i know these next three weeks are going to be really tough right

00:41:04.920 so what am i going to do what are the things that allow me to feel better and for you know

00:41:08.580 it's different things for different people some people meditate some people exercise some people

00:41:12.360 just speak to friends you know but do it it's a you know i always say to my patients it's amazing

00:41:16.680 how much time you know we make in our diaries from work we very rarely put in time for for our

00:41:22.740 physical health and you need to take it as seriously as that i know this is a crazy next

00:41:26.480 three weeks and this is what's going to happen i'm going to take some time out to ensure that

00:41:30.240 i'm okay and hopefully you'll find that kind of helps with that the self-care is huge yeah it was

00:41:35.960 a gandhi that said normally i meditate once a day when i'm busy i meditate twice a day is how

00:41:40.780 Yeah, I think it was kind of someone.

00:41:42.560 Someone wise and old.

00:41:43.940 Do you guys meditate?

00:41:45.840 I do.

00:41:47.140 Do you know these light and sound machines?

00:41:50.800 They have, like, binaural sounds and, like, light vision goggles.

00:41:55.140 They kind of simulate the experience of meditation.

00:41:57.540 So I do that every now and again.

00:41:59.940 Which is, you know, why?

00:42:01.120 No, I don't.

00:42:01.560 I'm healthy.

00:42:03.080 I go to the gym, though, and it's amazing going to the gym,

00:42:05.680 how actually your mental and physical health have completely changed.

00:42:10.780 it's it's weird it's almost like a therapy session you go in and suddenly you come out and

00:42:15.600 your sense of perspective about your problems in inverted commas whatever they may be

00:42:19.480 suddenly they they don't seem as insurmountable absolutely well i think there's something

00:42:23.520 meditative even in working out right you have to focus whether it's running and focusing on

00:42:27.420 your breathing or lifting or whatever it is so you're in there now so all this noise and i think

00:42:32.180 that's the other thing you know there's so much going around you know you need to curate your

00:42:36.880 consciousness right there's a lot of junk out there right whether it's the trolls online or

00:42:41.780 whether it's the worry that you're not doing enough or whatever it is so having a place whether

00:42:45.880 it's meditating or the gym where it's just about that i think is yeah hugely beneficial actually

00:42:52.100 you made me think about something i play basketball uh regularly and it's something i've noticed

00:42:56.680 basketball is very physical very competitive sport you know you hit people you get hit it's

00:43:01.480 very like that and one of the things i noticed every time i'm driving to the court i find like

00:43:07.220 and this is maybe a man thing or maybe it's just a constant thing i wanted to ask you what that's

00:43:11.320 about it's like i feel myself uh like when i'm at home with my wife i'm very gentle i'm very calm

00:43:17.740 etc but when i'm driving to basketball i feel like almost like a hard shell that i'm kind of

00:43:22.840 closing up ready for that fight what is what is that about is there a theory that explains this

00:43:28.520 Well, look, so much of our behavior is situation-specific, right?

00:43:32.540 So, you know, the idea that we're different people in different situations,

00:43:37.100 of course you're going to be different at home than you are there.

00:43:39.840 So clearly, whatever those kind of expectations, those triggers are,

00:43:43.840 have to do with kind of being competitive, with kind of being hyper-masculine,

00:43:47.420 and that works for you in that situation.

00:43:49.440 So what you're doing is you're kind of preparing for that.

00:43:52.320 I remember a friend of mine that worked in addiction for a long time saying to me

00:43:55.680 that the vast majority of overdoses tend to happen

00:43:59.740 in places where people aren't used to shooting up.

00:44:02.180 And she said because the minute that you shoot up

00:44:04.520 in a different place, you don't have those visual cues, right?

00:44:07.140 So you're having the visual cues of I'm in the car,

00:44:09.320 I've got my shorts on, I've got the music.

00:44:11.260 So, you know, it's Pavlovian, right?

00:44:13.700 And it's the same thing.

00:44:14.720 When you don't have those visual cues, you know, you act differently.

00:44:18.480 I've got a little toxic masculinity as I'm driving to this.

00:44:21.900 Listen, I was going to ask you about, you talk about skin,

00:44:23.940 but I imagine that this psychosomatic effect goes way beyond skin.

00:44:27.800 I'm sure it affects everything.

00:44:29.340 What about things like cancer and things like that?

00:44:31.440 Is that something that's affected by your mental state?

00:44:34.280 There's a huge amount of research to suggest that even things like wound healing

00:44:38.040 are affected by your mental state.

00:44:40.760 Recovery after, my dad had a heart operation years ago,

00:44:44.400 and I remember there's some amazing work being done at UCL

00:44:46.920 around journaling and wound healing recovery

00:44:50.120 and just kind of the ability just to kind of say,

00:44:51.960 this is what I did today, and this is what was good about the day or bad,

00:44:55.340 some amazing results.

00:44:56.640 So we know absolutely in almost every realm this idea that the mind's, you know,

00:45:01.640 here and the body's here, it's not true.

00:45:04.640 You know, the two are connected, you know, and it's not mumbo-jumbo.

00:45:08.340 It's not kind of think yourself better and it'll be great.

00:45:10.300 It's much deeper than that.

00:45:11.380 We're trying to, you know, now we're kind of finding the mechanisms

00:45:13.880 that actually translate into what it means,

00:45:16.980 into how your immune system works or is compromised,

00:45:19.520 into, you know, how differing levels of hormones affect

00:45:23.660 the way that your body repairs itself or inflammation or whatnot.

00:45:30.120 To wrap up, I wanted to move, because, onto depression.

00:45:34.020 So I'd end it on a high.

00:45:35.620 But because there's...

00:45:37.340 I talk to a lot of people about, you know, about mental health,

00:45:41.440 especially because I'm in comedy

00:45:42.580 and everybody seems to have a mental health issue in comedy.

00:45:44.880 Otherwise, why would you be on a stage telling jokes to people?

00:45:47.060 What if you're just funny and naturally funny like me?

00:45:49.520 Yeah, but you wouldn't feel the need to get up on stage

00:45:52.020 seeking affirmation from strangers.

00:45:53.660 I hate to break it to you.

00:45:54.980 What is the difference between being a bit down

00:45:57.360 and having depression?

00:45:59.080 And at what point should you seek help from somebody?

00:46:02.420 I'm so glad you asked that.

00:46:03.900 I think we kind of, in our society,

00:46:08.020 we use words like, oh, I'm anxious or I'm depressed.

00:46:10.940 And we think, you know, it means depression and anxiety.

00:46:14.920 Actually, you know, depression is...

00:46:17.680 There's a quantitative difference.

00:46:19.340 And so, yeah, we all know what it feels like to be low.

00:46:21.760 But when you speak to someone who's going through sort of serious depression,

00:46:26.100 there is a huge sense of overwhelming hopelessness and helplessness.

00:46:32.000 The basics, you know, I'm going to get up in the morning and take a shower,

00:46:35.580 feel like I'm going to, you know, climb a mountain.

00:46:38.620 You begin to isolate socially.

00:46:41.320 It affects your sleep.

00:46:42.680 It affects the way that you eat.

00:46:44.160 It affects your libido.

00:46:45.620 So it's like an all-encompassing thing.

00:46:48.040 So this idea that people are like, oh, if you're depressed, just, you know, snap out of it, you know, and thank goodness we're kind of moving away from that.

00:46:54.700 But, you know, I think part of that's happened because we all know what it feels like to be down, right?

00:46:58.520 And to be down, you know, even when you're really down, you kind of know that this will pass.

00:47:02.200 There's a part of you that knows.

00:47:03.680 When you're seriously depressed, there's a big part of you that thinks that this will never pass.

00:47:08.820 Not only won't it pass, that somehow this is a character flaw in me that won't pass.

00:47:14.020 I think that's one of the saddest things about depression, that there's no sense of entitlement over it in the way that there would be over any other illness, you know.

00:47:22.000 So, you know, God forbid someone has, you know, cancer or MS, there's like a sense of, you know, I have this and I'm going to fight it and it's going to be.

00:47:28.880 With depression, it's like, yeah, but really everyone's depressed.

00:47:31.920 You know, is it just me?

00:47:33.340 And, you know, I think if people hear nothing else, they need to feel a sense of entitlement over their mental health the way that they do over their physical health.

00:47:39.900 Because that's the only way to get the support that you need.

00:47:43.900 And we know that it's a very big killer, the way that a lot of physical illnesses are.

00:47:49.100 As a slight counterpoint to that, I know for myself, right, that I can very,

00:47:55.380 and maybe I'm misusing the word depression, but I can create for myself an experience of depression,

00:48:00.620 whatever that is, very easily.

00:48:01.940 I just need to not go out of the house, not do any exercise, not do anything.

00:48:05.920 Hang out with me.

00:48:06.320 Hang out with Francis, that always helps.

00:48:08.460 Not do any exercise, right, not go out of the house, not spend any time with my wife,

00:48:13.260 not spend time with friends, play too many computer games, maybe drink too much alcohol,

00:48:18.120 right? If I do five or six things for a period of two weeks, I will be feeling like you just

00:48:23.860 described, guaranteed. And how much of it is within our control? There is the possibility

00:48:30.160 of the self-care that you've talked about to make ourselves better.

00:48:34.040 Sure. Look, I think that there's definitely things that you can do to make yourself better

00:48:39.280 and make yourself feel worse right we know that depression has a genetic element right so now we

00:48:44.900 say you can win with a losing car a card and and lose with a winning card right so even if you have

00:48:50.120 a winning card if you like you're saying you're kind of socially isolating and drinking and not

00:48:53.800 kind of you know exercising you can very easily feel awful um the difference is is that for people

00:49:02.160 who who experience sort of um kind of serious depression is that it's just it's a it's a lot

00:49:08.220 harder and and they need some some support to get there so there's a qualitative difference to it

00:49:12.320 and we believe that um it's just it's harder to shift so it's not to say and i want people

00:49:18.860 listening again there's absolutely things you can do but if they're not working for you and

00:49:23.820 they're working for everyone else doesn't mean that you're doing them wrong it just means you

00:49:27.280 have a more serious form of depression yeah and you need help and you need help well on that note

00:49:32.300 you all need help that's it that's that's the whole point of the show uh listen lindy it's

00:49:39.240 been absolutely fantastic thank you so much for coming to talk to us the question we always like

00:49:43.300 to ask our guests at the end is is there one issue that we no one talks about that we ought

00:49:48.500 to be talking about or maybe just something we haven't covered in the interview that you think

00:49:51.660 is important to talk about um i guess i guess i think for me at the moment i think we need to be

00:49:58.000 talking about how the development of artificial intelligence is going to affect not just what

00:50:05.980 we're going to do economically but sort of socially as a group because I think it's going to come

00:50:10.200 perhaps a lot quicker than people expect. It's already starting to have some effect on us and

00:50:16.380 I think we just need to have sort of more serious conversations about how to protect our kids and

00:50:20.160 ourselves. And what kind of thing are you talking about when you say that specifically when you talk

00:50:23.880 about AI and things like that well I think already it's affecting the job market so you you've got

00:50:29.140 kids who are looking for jobs that won't exist by the time that you know they're out of you know

00:50:35.040 high school and university who are in their teens now so I think you know that's going to be a really

00:50:40.360 big obstacle for governments when you have you know a lot of joblessness we know that joblessness

00:50:45.380 and and you know poor mental health go go hand in hand we know that it's already an issue I you

00:50:51.220 And I think with the advent of automatisation, which is happening more and more, it's going to get worse.

00:50:55.840 And I just think we need to really think about it, not just in terms of economics,

00:50:59.500 but in terms of our society's, our society's mental health, our kind of collective subconscious.

00:51:06.040 What does this mean? Because a sense of purpose is very important.

00:51:09.460 And I don't think necessarily you have to make X amount of money to have a sense of purpose,

00:51:13.440 but you need to kind of figure out what you have to offer and where you belong.

00:51:17.040 And, you know, I think that before that sneaks up on us, we just need to have the right conversations.

00:51:23.280 Fantastic.

00:51:24.000 And you have a podcast which is called The Psychology Behind.

00:51:26.720 That's right.

00:51:27.040 And then you cover different topics.

00:51:28.460 And it's all very kind of positive change focused, I think, from what I've seen.

00:51:32.640 It's really about how do you be happy?

00:51:34.640 How do you do this?

00:51:35.580 Right.

00:51:35.880 Tell us a little bit about that.

00:51:37.040 Yeah.

00:51:37.300 So it's basically we take recent research.

00:51:40.180 It's a very short podcast, 15, 20 minutes.

00:51:41.840 We take a study out about, you know, how do I deal with shyness, how do I deal with failure, how to become happier.

00:51:47.760 All good for you, mate.

00:51:50.180 And we analyze the research and we kind of use it into actionable tips.

00:51:53.980 What are the five things you can do today to help you?

00:51:56.500 I've already subscribed.

00:51:58.880 Perfect. And you're on Twitter at?

00:52:01.620 At DrLinda underscore P.

00:52:04.040 Perfect. We'll put that in the video as well.

00:52:06.700 Thank you so much for coming on.

00:52:07.900 Thank you for coming.

00:52:08.360 if you've enjoyed it guys

00:52:09.500 subscribe as always

00:52:10.480 click that bell button

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00:52:23.180 with another brilliant episode

00:52:24.280 thanks very much

00:52:24.940 thanks guys

00:52:38.360 You

TRIGGERnometry - October 08, 2018

Dr Linda Papadopoulos on Trigger Warnings, Social Media & Mental Health

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