Road Rage "Disorder"

[mgidm86]

http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/06/05/road.rage.disease.ap/index.html

To you, that angry, horn-blasting tailgater is suffering from road rage. But doctors have another name for it -- intermittent explosive disorder -- and a new study suggests it is far more common than they realized, affecting up to 16 million Americans.

Big whoop, they have another name for it, so do I. It's called having a "temper". It's called being surrounded by more and more bad drivers every day. "intermittent Explosive Disorder"? Sounds more like a fart.

"People think it's bad behavior and that you just need an attitude adjustment, but what they don't know ... is that there's a biology and cognitive science to this,"

Yes, just as with everything else we do...there is a reason.

About 5 percent to 7 percent of the nationally representative sample had had the disorder, which would equal up to 16 million Americans. That is higher than better-known mental illnesses such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, Coccaro said.

Oh come ON!!!!! What a comparison! Are we now going to specifically medicate this? Soon, the act of breathing will be considered a disorder...anti-death syndrome maybe?

Does everything have to be a disorder? Can't we just call somebody a jackass and be done with it? Or am I being too cynical?

 

[slingblade]

Does everything have to be a disorder? Can't we just call somebody a jackass and be done with it? Or am I being too cynical?

I don't think so. Why does every single social problem have to suddenly be a "disorder?" I bet it has its very own pill, too. Or if not, it will have soon, and then the TV will be hollering "Ask your doctor if Antiassholia is right for you!"

Or better, grab him by the throat and rip the prescription pad outta his stinkin' hand!

 

[BPSCG]

Oh come ON!!!!! What a comparison! Are we now going to specifically medicate this?

I just wanna know if I can get handicapped plates. I'd just love for someone to yell at me when I get out of the car:

"Hey, @sswipe, that's a handicapped spot! You aren't handicapped!"

"@#$% you, you #$%^ing piece of ^%$#!!! I have intermittent explosive disorder!"

"Oh. I'm sorry."

"You better be..."

 

[TragicMonkey]

It's always unbelievable until you either get it yourself, or know someone else who has it.

 

[Earthborn]

It's called having a "temper".

I am sure you have noticed this:

Road rage, temper outbursts that involve throwing or breaking objects and even spousal abuse can sometimes be attributed to the disorder, though not everyone who does those things is afflicted.

It's called being surrounded by more and more bad drivers every day.

More and more bad drivers? Do you have any evidence that other drivers than yourself are getting worse? Or are you just overreacting?

Are we now going to specifically medicate this?

Hopefully.

Soon, the act of breathing will be considered a disorder...

Quite unlikely. The behaviours that are considered "disorders" are usually disturbed behaviours rather than necessary life functions.

Can't we just call somebody a jackass and be done with it? Or am I being too cynical?

And what exactly does that solve? Does it make the "jackass" less of a "jackass" ? Using your logic, can't we just call someone "crazy" instead of schizofrenic? Or "miserable" instead of depressed? "Sick" instead of "suffering from cancer" ?

 

[UserGoogol]

Of course road rage can be a mental disorder. The only difference between a mental disorder and a mental flaw is one of degree, and I see no reason why there cannot be a high enough degree of road rage to be considered a "disorder."

I don't know why people have such angst about calling things disorders. Of course it's a disorder. You wouldn't call road rage orderly, now would you? And if medication happens to be a feasible way to make it more orderly, then so be it.

 

[American]

I don't know why people have such angst about calling things disorders.

Because such people are bad people. Having a disease doesn't typically make one a bad person, but if we insist on calling this such... then that's what those people become.

Do we really want to attach moral judgements to a disease?

I do, because I don't care. But what do the little people think?

 

[Mr. Skinny]

Big whoop, they have another name for it, so do I. It's called having a "temper".

To be more correct, it's called having a "bad temper" or "poor temper", but "being a jackass" works for me too.

Myself, I just keep a De_Bunk brand (tm) collapsable police baton in the center armrest compartment thingy.

(no. I don't own a cell phone)

 

[jimlintott]

Road rage is a problem. I'm not sure giving it a fancy name will help. I doubt if it can be treated because I think different people have intermittent explosive episodes for a variety of reasons. Is intermittent really accurate? Doesn't intermittent imply a more predictable pattern? Road rager's explosive episodes are usually triggered by an external influence. I would think that makes them neither intermittent or random.

I watched a guy have an explosive episode because he almost ran into me when I stopped because the light changed to amber. The guy seemed pretty stressed.

Intermittent explosive disorder - I actually like that. I don't really care what they call it but then I have JDD, jargon detachment disorder. I sometimes wonder if these people are serious or if they are just preparing new material for George Carlin. I guess the answer is yes.

 

[gnome]

Some of the confusion is that you have different kinds of disorders. You have clinical disorders, where the cause is that the subject has a physical/chemical problem in their brain or nervous system that affects their behavior... then you have personality disorders, where the cause can be, for example, that the subject is a jackass.

That psychiatrists have more specific names for different kinds of jackassery doesn't mean they're saying it's OK to be that way--their concern is whether someone is treatable. If something like that CAN be treated, why not?

Furthermore, if they discover evidence that something previously thought to be a personality disorder has a clinical cause... shouldn't they announce that and describe medications?

 

[American]

That psychiatrists have more specific names for different kinds of jackassery doesn't mean they're saying it's OK to be that way--their concern is whether someone is treatable. If something like that CAN be treated, why not?

There are few silver bullets in medicine, even fewer with psychiatric pills. Lobotomy was a treatment. Lithium, Ritalin, and Prozac are exactly the same thing, but without leaving physical scars.

Add in the methods of psychotherapy, and you have an Orwellian perversion of what it means to be free (...not that psychiatrists believe in such things, or would even desire real choice for any part of society but themselves).

 

[Apollyon]

I got intermittent explosive disorder the first time I went to Hong Kong.

Thank goodness I wasn't driving.

 

[slingblade]

Oh, bad skeptics. Dig deeper, please.

One thing no one's really delved is the medicalization of behaviors.
Works like this:

1. Call a behavior a "disorder."
2. Give it definable, observable "symptoms" which will exactly fit a certain small number of people, and will "come close" in a larger number of others.
3. (most important) Create a drug which will "treat" this "disorder."
4. Market the drug.
5. Start the therapy sessions and support groups.
6. Ring the register frequently and sleep soundly, knowing you are helping people.

(side-effects: may cause just about anyone to start wondering if he has a disorder too, or if his neighbors have one, and just how many pill-heads live around here, anyway, and are any of them dangerous, and generally increase unease and create discomfort until everyone's taking a pill for something or other.)

 

[UserGoogol]

Except there's this thing called the scientific method. Through this method, we can determine if a given medication can help get rid of a given problem. So it's not like they're just throwing placeboes into the marketplace, pills like Ritalin or Zoloft work.

Are conditions like Attention-Defecit Hyperactivity Disorder and General Anxiety Disorder (and Intermittent Explosive Disorder) vaguely defined illnesses which lump together mental states which are perfectly normal? Maybe. Are they conditions which are unpleasant to have? Yes. Are they conditions which can be treated by medication or therapy or whatever? The evidence seems to say so, yeah.

So what's the problem? People have problems, we can help them, thus, we should help them. And if this road leads to everyone being on a pill for one thing or another, who cares? As long as people are happier, that's all that matters. And your "pill-heads" comments seems unsupported, as I've never heard much worry that Prozac users are going to start ransacking houses.

 

[andyandy]

The key part of the report is hardly new - it seems likely that for a proportion of the population chemical imbalances (such as a low level serotonin and/or a high level of testosterone) can make people pre-disposed to violent outbursts....

For a couple of decades, intermittent explosive disorder has been included in the manual psychiatrists use to diagnose mental illness, though with slightly different names and criteria. That has contributed to misunderstanding and underappreciation of the disorder, said Coccaro, a study co-author.

Coccaro said the disorder involves inadequate production or functioning of serotonin, a mood-regulating and behavior-inhibiting brain chemical. Treatment with antidepressants, including those that target serotonin receptors in the brain, is often helpful, along with behavior therapy akin to anger management, Coccaro said.

Most sufferers in the study had other emotional disorders or drug or alcohol problems and had gotten treatment for them, but only 28 percent had ever received treatment for anger.

"This is a well-designed, large-scale, face-to-face study with interesting and useful results," said Dr. David Fassler, a psychiatry professor at the University of Vermont. "The findings also confirm that for most people, the difficulties associated with the disorder begin during childhood or adolescence, and they often have a profound and ongoing impact on the person's life."

....it's pretty unhelpful to label it "road rage disorder" - as that implies a specific disorder for car-drivers...which makes a convienient strawman to knock down......