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Positive psychology reveals that happiness isn’t what most people think; it’s about building deep relationships and meaningful engagement.

The 8 stages of life

About a week ago, I watched the animated film “Everybody Rides the Carousel” by John Hubley. This movie explores Erik Erikson’s theory of Psychosocial development through the carousel metaphor. This theory states that social development is split into 8 stages, which build on each other throughout a lifetime. The stages of life are on the carousel, shown as different stops throughout the film. Stages have positive and negative sides to them. If you can master a stage and claim its positive benefits, you will be set up for success in later stages and lead a productive and healthy life.

The stages are:

• Trust vs. Mistrust in infancy
• Autonomy vs. Shame as a Toddler
• Initiative vs. Guilt during Preschool ages
• Industry vs. Inferiority during elementary school ages (industry as in fitting into a system of work/being productive, inferiority as in feeling inferior to those around you)
• Identity vs. Role Confusion during teenage years
• Intimacy vs. Isolation in young adulthood
• Generativity vs. Stagnation in middle adulthood (This is by far the longest stage, and represents maintenance in adult life)
• Integrity vs. Despair at the end of life (looking back on life and becoming ready to die)

The movie is structured by a narrator explaining a stage on the carousel and then showing an anthological scene with a person going through that stage of life.

For example, the movie begins by explaining a newborn’s concept of trust vs. mistrust, the first stage of life a person must pass through. A baby learns to trust his mother, benefiting from her for warmth and comfort. The movie illustrates this trust as a warm and cuddly cat. This theme of illustrating the different stages is present throughout the film. Later, when the child meets his grandma, a sense of mistrust forms. This mistrust manifests itself as a scaredy cat.

I most enjoyed this movie’s raw emotional feel. The director’s style makes the dialogue feel like it was recorded during an actual person’s life. The drawings were added later to retell the scene.

The movie was an extremely effective, emotional, and creative way to express Erik Erikson’s 8 stages of life. It gave me deep, reflective insights into life and myself.

The most good for the most people

My philosophical debate club discussed utilitarianist concepts and when they go too far. Originally, I got everyone to agree with the core concept of utilitarianism: doing the most good for the most people.

After this, I drew an example of the trolley car problem on the board, where two people are stuck on one side of a track and one is stuck on the other. The train is moving towards the two people. If you choose to flick the lever, only one person on the other side of the track dies.

By utilitarian philosophy, you should flick the lever 100% of the time, so that the most people get the best outcome. With this example of the problem, almost everyone in the club agreed to flick the lever aside, except one person.

The one detractor stated, “I don’t feel comfortable changing fate like that and killing a person who wouldn’t have been killed otherwise; it’s not my place.”

People opposed to utilitarianism often use some variation of this. Even if something causes the most good, people eventually become uncomfortable with the amount of power they have or how much it goes against traditional moral views.

I believe utilitarianism and moral philosophies as a whole are not to be followed exactly, and everyone should have their jurisdiction on such issues, but delving into these difficult questions provides intimate insight into different perceptions of morality, and by extension, the world as a whole.

The importance of individuality

Too often, I have found myself sitting in a highly educated therapist or psychiatrist’s room and felt no progress had been made. These people who had spent thousands of hours studying the human mind and how to help with anxiety never aided mine. This wasn’t due to a lack of participation on my or their end. I tried to open up and listen to their advice. I am confident they were equipped with the right information to help guide me along a healthier path.

However, no matter how hard I tried or how knowledgeable they were, there were some therapists I didn’t click with therapeutically.

The thing I felt was missing from those interactions, and an important aspect of therapy that has often been overlooked in my experience, is being heard as an individual rather than a statistic. Psychology involves a lot of crucial study and research, but implementing any of it in therapy or counseling is nearly impossible without a human connection. Each data point in a survey, each case study, and each person participating in an experiment is a life just as deep and unique as anyone else’s.

When a therapist attempts to apply a formula rather than experience their patient as an individual, it doesn’t work. It’s like what Robin Williams’ character said in Good Will Hunting:

“If I asked you about art, you would probably tell me about every art book ever written. Michelangelo, you know a lot about him… but you can’t tell me what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel. You’ve never stood there and looked up at that beautiful ceiling.”

-Robin Williams (Playing Sean Maguire) in good will hunting

You cannot know everything about a person through research; you must treat them as individuals and be vulnerable yourself. Only then can you apply research and truly reach them.

This is where psychology and philosophy intersect. Philosophy can bring out individuality in therapeutic spaces. Philosophy has no solution, no formula; it is up to the individual to interpret the information and gain meaning from it. Discussing philosophy is a great way to get to know someone. It allows for exploring a person’s mind in a way no scientific measure can.

The myth of scientific objectivity

Scientific objectivity is a widely held ideal in research. But the exact definition of this “objectivity” can vary. One definition is to remove personal values from research. This way, science becomes separate from human influence. However, no matter the definition, no area of science can be entirely objective and value-free because it is impossible to identify all values affecting research and successfully eliminate them; there are simply too many variables and uncertainties to consider.

Contextual values affect research during every step of the scientific process. Contextual values are personal values that relate to social constructs such as morality or politics.

For example, when a researcher has a preconceived notion of how the world should work, they may conduct research specifically to support that view, and not to benefit science as a whole. The influence of contextual values can be present in four distinct stages of the scientific process. They can affect

• the choice of what to research,

• the gathering of evidence,

• the acceptance of a theory or hypothesis as adequate, and

• the application of results.

The choice and application of research are seen as inherently tied to contextual values. However, the other sections, the gathering of evidence and the acceptance of a theory or hypothesis, are where the Value-Neutrality Thesis (VNT) arise.

The Value Neutrality Thesis (VNT) is fulfilled if scientists can gather evidence and accept theories without making contextual value judgments. Scientists must be impartial, neutral, and autonomous; however, methods to fulfill these requirements have counterarguments.

Impartiality is when things are accepted based only on their contributions to the cognitive values of science; neutrality means being concerned only with what there is, not what there should be; and autonomy is the idea that science is shaped by the desire to increase scientific knowledge.

These three segments combine to form a theoretical value-free science.

Autonomy is often challenged due to research funding largely coming from corporations with a bias. To be clear, if corporate funding were removed, important scientific research could never be funded. However, corporate funding subjects researchers to bias. In the 1950s, research studies funded by tobacco companies concluded that the health risk of smoking was minimal. Recent research suggest a similar story is happening with seed oils, which may be as bad for your health as tobacco (yet for decades have been touted by industry-funded research as healthier than other types of fats).

Impartiality is threatened when a researcher is faced with the choice to accept results as accurate or dig further. In the same vein, researchers often use previously conducted research to motivate new studies. Scientific knowledge builds upon itself. Choosing what to accept as fact becomes a repeated step for gathering data and accepting theory. Inevitably, values seep in this process.

Ultimately, any science that matters to humanity builds on prior knowledge and is entangled with ethical principles. Therefore, values cannot be removed from applicable science. However, scientific research can, and should, strive towards value neutrality.

The OCD paradox

The label or diagnosis of OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) changes people. This, in turn, evolves the meaning of the label “OCD.”

Let’s start with some definitions:

Natural kinds are categorizations that exist within the confines of the natural world and are unaffected by human ideas and influences. The rain is a natural kind.

Social constructs are the opposite of this; they are identifications made by humans and align with human ideals and values. Marriage is a social construct.

What counts as social constructs versus natural kinds is debated. Both are valuable to science because they interact.

With Obsessive Compulsive Behavior or Disorder, the underlying processes are natural kinds; however, the classification of these processes as a specific disorder is a social construct. These two work together to make OCD an interactive kind. An interactive kind is a category that affects those classified by it. In turn, those people may change the category itself.

OCD is a result of natural chemical processes in the brain, relating it to natural kinds. It is caused by a dysfunction in brain circuitry. It is known to be hereditary and can be improved with psychiatric medication. All of these qualities exist independently of human thought or influence.

OCD is also different from other mental disorders in that it involves a specific way of thinking rather than a mental or emotional state. While OCD causes feelings of distress, sadness, and fear, it exists beyond the presence of those emotions. For example, while depression is categorized by extreme sadness and loss of hope, OCD is categorized by a loop that involves a perceived threat, followed by compulsion, and temporary relief. How one initially perceives the threat and the mental state surrounding that moment is irrelevant; the process (loop) is functional and behavioral.

In this way, OCD is comparable to biological processes in other areas of the body, like the heart or stomach. These similarities may ground OCD in a realm of physicality beyond that of other mental disorders, although that’s up for debate. 

The compulsive loop of OCD is a common property in all individuals afflicted by it. It is observable, categorizable, and caused by a specific dysfunction. Medication or exposure therapy often help reduce symptoms.

OCD is a classification based on social construct; however, the symptoms are present with or without it. While there are many different types of OCD, the shared symptoms across different cases affect each one in the same way.  

Also, like other natural kinds, OCD forms a causal hierarchy. The neurobiology forms the cognitive process, which causes the clinical symptoms, ultimately impacting behaviors.

To call OCD a disorder, to find the threshold at which it occurs, and to group these symptoms all have to do with social constructs. Social constructs undoubtedly influenced the treatments, labels, and explanations of OCD.  

However, after humanity’s response was constructed, people began adjusting their reactions and identifications to these behaviors. Thus, the label and treatment impacted the function of OCD. Symptoms “changed.” The social constructs affected the natural kinds, which then affected the constructs again. It is a classic example of philosopher of science Ian Hackings’ middle ground, where social constructs and natural kinds create a feedback loop on each other.

An interactive kind changes as a result of being classified. OCD symptoms are real and natural, but the classification is shaped by humanity’s history, ideals, classification, and treatment. Neither one encapsulates the full picture of the disorder, and both work together and affect each other. 

The war between care and control

Psychiatry has a long and controversial history. Each era—from supernatural explanations, to asylums, to modern psychiatry—has been marked by frequent malpractice.

The anti-psychiatry movement began in the mid-20th century. It called for deinstitutionalization and more autonomous approaches to mental health care. Supporters believed the medical model should not be applied to mental illness, and argued for a more human-centered approach.

Still, with each advancement, psychiatry has saved more lives, added safeguards, and moved closer to a person-centered model. We are far from the days of burning witches and performing lobotomies.

Yet power struggles remain, especially in how the system treats individuals with aggression. The clinical approach to mental illness, particularly in these cases, can function as a form of social control.

This doesn’t mean psychiatry should be discarded, but it does call for serious reform in how the system views and treats its patients.

Psychiatry is not purely scientific; it reflects the values of the culture around it. Originally, its purpose was to exclude the mentally ill from society. Economic productivity was seen as the measure of human worth. Those who couldn’t produce were considered valueless.

That began to change at the end of the 18th century. While the mentally ill were still seen as unproductive, they were no longer exiled. Instead, they were “disciplined” through treatment. This shift marked psychiatry’s transformation from exclusion to intervention. Patients gained a small degree of autonomy, but the help they received still served society more than the individual.

Today, mental illness is less stigmatized. Still, psychiatry keeps its controlling role, especially in cases involving crime. Though treatment is now framed as care, it often functions as containment. Psychiatry continues to hold immense power.

The distinction between social influence and scientific objectivity in psychiatry is not binary. Human experience is shaped by both. If psychiatry puts the individual first, it can evolve into a more ethical field with fewer power struggles. Putting the value of society behind the individual may sound like it will lead to societal problems. But when people are supported as individuals, they become more cooperative and better citizens.