Re: ::scr The Geek Syndrome

[celia romaniuk <space@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 7 Dec 2001, Earle Martin wrote:

> Good grief - I'm dyspraxic! I had no idea! There were always a few things I
> thought were because of the ADD - my clumsiness, short term problems,
> abysmal sense of direction, difficulty in making my mouth produce what I'm
> thinking about - for a long time I've thought my mouth was "slower than my
> brain" but have never known why. "Sensitive to touch" - that's fascinating.
> I've always been ultra-ticklish, and now I know why.
  
Hm. I'm all those things too, but I don't think I'm dyspraxic. I can't
help thinking here of 'medical studentitis', which is basically where
people who are hyperaware of conditions start to feel its symptoms. c.f.
http://www.studentbmj.com/back_issues/1199/education/410.html

All I'm saying is that it's easy to identify a bunch of characteristics in
yourself and give them a handy label. I'm not saying that dyspraxia etc
don't exist - just that it reminds me an awful lot of astrology ("I'm so
crap at making decisions. It's because I'm a Libran".) Labels are
appealing because they allow us to make sense of our amorphous selves. But
just because they're comforting doesn't mean that the messy bits of who we
are goes away. People aren't jigsaw puzzles.

I had an interesting conversation with a neurologist a few weeks ago, in
the course of doing user research for a pharmaceutical company's web
shite. We were talking about the value of patient's access to information
online. I asked him if he thought there might be a risk in patients
misdiagnosing themselves if they had access to large quantities of
information on disorders. His answer was that, yes, that risk is there,
but it's not a greater risk than having a doctor make a misdiagnosis. He
then went on to talk about how medicine is not an exact science - it's
based on statistical evidence. And that that is just as hard to convey to
medical students in college as it is to patients. Ultimately, you need a
variety of opinions and access to good quality information.

Having said all that, I think it's important to recognise issues,
especially with kids, and to help them find ways of dealing with things
that might be hindering their education, but also accepting aspects of
their personality.

Erm, that was more random that I hoped it would be.

-- 
celia
...(small town, slow news day)