Psychology is not all about Pavlov's dog or research methods, there's a lot more to it!
Thanks insanipi for the great start to a promising thread! :)Anytime haha <3
Do you think that genetics significantly influence mental health? Do you think that the conclusions from this study can be considered valid, considering the population it was conducted on?I don't know if I would say that I think genetics significantly influences mental health. From a bit of reading, it seems across most mental health disorders there is a range of different findings suggesting different severities of correlation between mental health disorders and genetics. I think its becoming increasingly accepted that mental health disorders are associated with genetic risk factors, but what remains to further characterised is the extent to which genetics play this role. It is likely that this is dependent on the mental disorder itself as I imagine some disorders are far more influenced by environmental risk factors than others might be.
Do you think that CBT actually has an effect on ageing, or is just effective at treating anxiety disorders which could cause premature ageing?My understanding from the article was that the authors of the scientific study interpreted their results as indicating CBT prevents the increased cellular ageing associated with anxiety disorders. From this I would imagine that CBT prevents this aging, not by having an inherent anti-ageing effect itself, but by combating axiety symptoms which may cause the increased cellular ageing. Although, as it goes with science, more research will have to be conducted before this relationship can be properly explained.
I don't know if I would say that I think genetics significantly influences mental health. From a bit of reading, it seems across most mental health disorders there is a range of different findings suggesting different severities of correlation between mental health disorders and genetics. I think its becoming increasingly accepted that mental health disorders are associated with genetic risk factors, but what remains to further characterised is the extent to which genetics play this role. It is likely that this is dependent on the mental disorder itself as I imagine some disorders are far more influenced by environmental risk factors than others might be.I've seen that a lot. Especially with mental illnesses like schizophrenia (schizo-effective and schizoid personality). The other link that has been established, (but ofd course the extent is not known), is that females who have a mother with depression are at a higher risk of having it. Genetics is an area of science where there is still so much to learn; this is especially true when considering the role that the environment plays on genetics.
I do think these findings are still reasonably valid and at least very insightfull. While its perhaps hard to generalise these findings to populations outside of these military veterans, I think its important to realise that its really hard to actually get perfect populations of the general population, particularly for these mass genonomic analyses.That's true. I was more thinking about the way that both genetics and environment affect phenotype, so knowing to what extent the genes are influencing the development of mental health conditions in veterans may be difficult because of the trauma that they may have been exposed to and the impact that has had on them. I guess that this can still be considered as everyone in the group has been through similar traumatic events, and it has disproportionately lead to the development of mental illnesses in people with certain genes.
My understanding from the article was that the authors of the scientific study interpreted their results as indicating CBT prevents the increased cellular ageing associated with anxiety disorders. From this I would imagine that CBT prevents this aging, not by having an inherent anti-ageing effect itself, but by combating axiety symptoms which may cause the increased cellular ageing. Although, as it goes with science, more research will have to be conducted before this relationship can be properly explained.Do you think that CBT could be helpful to everyone in slowing down ageing, as it may help people who are feeling stressed (but do not have a diagnosed anxiety condition) to manage how they are feeling and thus prevent premature ageing, or do you think that this is a kind of therapy that would only prevent premature aging when people are dealing with significant amounts of anixety due to the effect that that has on the body?