Dr. Gary Bell's Absurd Psychology

Often, narcissistic parents perceive the independence of their child as a threat. What distinguishes the narcissistic parent is a pervasive tendency to deny their child's independent selfhood. Biggest telltale signs of a narcissistic parent include emotional manipulation, lack of empathy, and neglect. Tune in a learn how to identify and deal with care-taking a narcissist parent!

Critical race theory (CRT), initially created as a body of legal theory, is an organizing framework useful in understanding human behavior and social processes relevant to racial group categorizations and racial stratification. Critical race theory examines the oppressive dynamics of society to inform individual, group, and social transformation. Rather than embracing a colorblind perspective, CRT...

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a mental disorder in which people experience unwanted and repeated thoughts, feelings, images, or sensations (obsessions) and engage in behaviors or mental acts (compulsions) in response. Often a person with OCD carries out the compulsions to temporarily eliminate or reduce the impact of obsessions, and not performing them causes distress. OCD varies in sever...

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a developmental disorder that involves impairments in social interaction and communication, challenges with sensory processing, and repetitive behaviors. The term spectrum reflects the fact that symptoms vary across different individuals, ranging in type and severity. ASD is an umbrella diagnosis in the DSM-5, replacing the four pervasive developmental disorders d...

Behavior is said to be self-sabotaging when it creates problems in daily life and interferes with long-standing goals. The most common self-sabotaging behaviors include procrastination, self-medication with drugs or alcohol, comfort eating, and forms of self-injury such as cutting. People aren't always aware that they are sabotaging themselves, and connecting a behavior to self-defeating consequen...

Irritation, frustration, anger, rage: these are all forms of anger. And they are feelings first. But when a person's rage becomes behavior even before thought has a chance to plug in, it is usually because of one of two reasons: 1) it's been repressed for a long time, and when someone drops the proverbial straw, it explodes; 2) it works for manipulative purposes. Either way it has something to do...

Belief in miracles is widespread. According to recent surveys 72% of people in the USA and 59% of people in the UK believe that miracles take place. Why do so many people believe in miracles in the present age of advanced science and technology? Let us briefly consider three possible answers to this question. The first possible answer is simply that miracles actually do take place all the time. If...

Defense mechanisms are rooted in Freud's theory of personality. According to his model, the mind has three dueling forces: the id (unconscious and primitive urges for food, comfort, and sex), the superego (a partly conscious drive toward moral and social values), and the ego (a partly conscious force that moderates the id and superego). Anxiety, in this paradigm, emerges when the needs of the id c...

Pornography use is a widespread means of dealing with one's sexual drives. More than 90 percent of young men report watching porn videos with some regularity, particularly in the United States. Many of these videos depict acts that they might never engage in themselves—in other words, erotic fantasies. On Pornhub, the world's largest porn website, alone, well over 90 billion videos are viewed dail...

Why, then, do we find the basic narrative so appealing? What is the underlying psychology behind apocalyptic prophecies, both religious and secular? The answer lies in the emotional and cognitive processes of our brains. Emotionally, the end of the world is actually a renewal, a transition to a new beginning and a better life to come. In religious narratives, God smites sinners and resurrects the...

Adolescence is the transitional stage from childhood to adulthood that occurs between ages 13 and 19. The physical and psychological changes that take place in adolescence often start earlier, during the preteen or tween years: between ages 9 and 12. Adolescence can be a time of both disorientation and discovery. The transitional period can raise questions of independence and identity; as adolesce...

Persistent depressive disorder, known as dysthymia or low-grade depression, is less severe than major depression but more chronic. It occurs twice as often in women as in men. Persistent depressive disorder (PDD) is a serious and disabling disorder that shares many symptoms with other forms of clinical depression. It is generally experienced as a less severe but more chronic form of major depressi...

A stroke occurs when the blood supply to part of your brain is interrupted or reduced, preventing brain tissue from getting oxygen and nutrients. Brain cells begin to die in minutes. A stroke is a medical emergency, and prompt treatment is crucial. Early action can reduce brain damage and other complications. The good news is that many fewer Americans die of stroke now than in the past. Effective...

People with panic disorder often experience negative thoughts with self-defeating beliefs. This is especially the case during a panic attack when your inner voice may amplify your fears and anxiety. For example, when panic takes hold, you may believe that you really are going to stop breathing or that you truly are going crazy. In order to change your thinking, you must first become aware of these...

As a marriage dissolves, some parents find themselves asking questions like, "Should we stay together for the kids?" Other parents find divorce is their only option. And while all parents may have many worries on their mind—from the future of their living situation to the uncertainty of the custody arrangement—they may worry most about how the children will deal with the divorce. So what are the p...

One of the mysteries puzzling human mind since the origin of mankind is the concept of "reincarnation" which literally means "to take on the flesh again." As the civilizations evolved, beliefs got discriminated and disseminated into various religions. The major division manifested was "East" and "West." The eastern religions being more philosophical and less analytical, have accepted reincarnation...

Fear and anxiety may not be anyone's favorite emotions, but these powerful sensations go a long way in keeping us safe. If the dog down the street bites you, the fear that results when you next see the dog will help you avoid another bite. But what about when the response goes too far? If you instead come to fear all dogs, not just the one that bit you, that fear might drastically change where you...

Impostor syndrome (IS) refers to an internal experience of believing that you are not as competent as others perceive you to be. While this definition is usually narrowly applied to intelligence and achievement, it has links to perfectionism and the social context. To put it simply, imposter syndrome is the experience of feeling like a phony—you feel as though at any moment you are going to be fou...

To say that the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has changed the world would be an understatement. In less than a year since the virus emerged — and just over 6 months since tracking began in the United States — it's upended day-to-day lives across the globe. The pandemic has changed how we work, learn and interact as social distancing guidelines have led to a more virtual existence, both per...

For those who do wind up divorced, there seems to be a magic number for when. No matter where in the world you're from or in what culture you've been raised, you're most likely to get a divorce…drum roll…four years into your marriage. Even more fascinating is why our human brains have evolved to hone a drive for love and partnership that lasts just long enough to raise a single child through infan...

The Oxford English Dictionary defines "oppression" as "the state of being subject to unjust treatment or control." However, this does not mean that those subjected to unjust treatment or control are aware of it. This is an aspect of oppression that is largely missed in popular culture when we consider whether we or others are being oppressed. Indeed, when living day to day in concert with the cons...

If you are worried about the future of your marriage or relationship, you have plenty of company. There's no denying that this is a frightening time for couples. More than half of all first marriages end in divorce; 60 percent of second marriages fail. What makes the numbers even more disturbing is that no one seems to understand why our marriages have become so fragile. In pursuit of the truth ab...

Existential angst not only derives from the human inability to think, feel, and act in the world or experience a love for life, but also from the fear of the possibility of nonexistence and/or death. It can be lonely, isolating, and outright terrifying if one's very existence is in question. Psychologist Carl Jung and philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre had similar thoughts about existential angst in tha...

How to stop eating emotionally? Emotional eating (sometimes called stress eating or comfort eating) is difficult to control partly because we have no control over its biological determinants (e.g., genes). But what if other factors, ones that are easier to modify, were of greater importance to emotional eating? These other determinants—according to an article in the November 2018 issue of Appetite...

Burnout is a state of emotional, mental, and often physical exhaustion brought on by prolonged or repeated stress. Though it's most often caused by problems at work, it can also appear in other areas of life, such as parenting, caretaking, or romantic relationships. Burnout is not simply a result of working long hours or juggling too many tasks, though those both play a role. The cynicism, depress...