Identity satiation

This is a slightly altered version of a short article first published in Quillette, and is the first ever piece of writing I had published! Thanks heaps to Quillette and Iona Italia for granting me permission to republish it here.

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I am not alone in wondering why the people and groups most inclined to focus on their identity, self-care, and 'knowing' themselves appear to actually be the most distressed, confused, and mentally unwell. Why has mental health gotten worse, and identity disorders increased, alongside the societal emphasis on self-care and accurately knowing and expressing oneself? Is it possible that the new therapy culture and the emphasis on introspection actually makes us more confused and unwell?

This idea is not without precedent, and I am certainly not the first to make this claim. Abigail Shrier’s book Bad Therapy expertly delineated this argument. However, there is a range of relevant phenomena that I don’t often see discussed, and which could further lend credence to this idea. These are the research on semantic satiation and ironic uncertainty, the effects of mirror gazing, the effects of meditation, and how these all relate to the constant introspection (essentially rumination) which is pushed on young people through therapy culture and the attendant concept creep.

Semantic satiation is the uncanny sensation that occurs when one repeats a word or sentence again and again, until it appears foreign, nonsensical, and utterly meaningless to the speaker. You may have done this as a child, repeating a word in quick succession until you seem to no longer recognize what the word is or what it means. It's a highly reliable effect - you can try it now with any word. Repeat it to yourself quickly, out loud, for an extended period, and really focus on the word and its meaning. Under these circumstances, most people experience semantic satiation; the word loses all meaning or sounds nonsensical.

This is a well-studied phenomenon, sometimes under different labels such as "inhibition", "fatigue", "lapse of meaning", "adaptation", "stimulus satiation" and others. It doesn’t only occur in the linguistic realm, but visually as well. Studies have shown that compulsive staring at an object can result in dissociation and derealization: a sense that one no longer recognizes the object, or that it is no longer meaningful. Likewise, repeatedly visually checking something can make one uncertain of one's perception, and result, ironically, in uncertainty and poor memory of the object. This may also occur with facial recognition.

More interestingly, however, a similar phenomenon occurs in the realm of self-perception. Mirror gazing (staring into one’s own eyes in the mirror) is known to induce feelings of depersonalization and derealization, and result in distortions of self-perception and bodily sensation. This persistent visual self-inspection can result in one feeling that they don't recognize their own face, that they no longer feel real, that their body no longer feels the same as it once did or that it is not their body. It is in fact so reliable in producing these depersonalization and realization effects (and a wide range of other anomalous effects), that the mirror gazing task can be used in experimental manipulations to trigger these symptoms for research.

This effect doesn’t only occur with visual self-inspection, but with mental introspection too. I call it "identity satiation". This has been known for thousands of years and is the basis of many Buddhist and other spiritual practices. It has long been known, in meditative practices, that extended periods of introspection and self-contemplation result in a sense of identity loss and depersonalization-derealization. A well-known disorder, depersonalization-derealization has eerily familiar sounding symptoms. It “affects your ability to recognize your thoughts, feelings and body as your own”.

Buddhists developed many practices designed to induce this feeling, such as the practice of spending extended periods of time trying to "find" where one is located in one’s body until, unsuccessful, one experiences identity loss, depersonalization, and derealization. This process of introspection is like trying to tightly grip a bar of soap, the more you try to perceive yourself the harder it becomes. Other practices have practitioners focus on or "listen" intensely to their thoughts for extended periods of time, until they no longer identify with their train of thought and come to feel separated from their internal monologue. This is identity satiation at work, and it occurs through this persistent introspection.

Not surprisingly then, it is also well known in psychiatry that rumination—a kind of persistent introspection and a compulsive focus on one’s internal sensations, thoughts, or identity—is one of the hallmarks of anxiety disorders of various kinds, as well as disorders such as depersonalization-derealization. People who ruminate–engaging in compulsive introspection–can become increasingly uncertain, anxious, and confused.

These phenomena provide an explanation for the worsening mental health outcomes of young people who are now constantly encouraged to reflexively explore and inspect their own feelings and identities until they can label every aspect of themselves, and to do so during a stage of life in which their bodies and identities are in a state of flux. The school curricula and the social dialogue dominating in the West features endless discussions of identity and encourages constant introspection (essentially, rumination). These replicate thought patterns which have been shown to result in poorer understanding and more confusion, and which inadvertently end up broaching complex topics that have occupied serious philosophers for years (such as cartesian dualism). This likely results in identity satiation, both through the semantic satiation of the words associated with various identity concepts, and through whatever mechanism drives the depersonalization-derealization effects of meditation and rumination.

Therefore, this proliferation of therapy culture—ostensibly spread to encourage self-knowing and mental well-being—has erroneously pushed behaviors thought to be the cure, but which for most people are actually the poison. The constant introspection has only left people more confused and uncertain about their own identities than ever.

The number of people identifying as non-binary or trans has skyrocketed in recent years, and an increasing number of schools are now teaching and discussing gender-theory content with children. While this may be beneficial for those already organically struggling with gender confusion, it may present an avenue for otherwise cis children to ruminate and become confused via identity satiation.

The kind of gender-theory content increasingly being taught in schools encourages children to spend extended periods of time ruminating on self-concepts which most would not otherwise have engaged or struggled with. They are given exercises which encourage them to doubt their own unconscious intuitions about themselves, and to sit and think (ruminate): "Do I feel like a boy? What does that even mean, to feel like a boy? I thought I was a boy but what if I am not?".

These questions, about what it "feels" like to be x or y, are often confusing and difficult to verbalize, even for the most unquestioningly cis adult. But to have children ruminate on such elusive concepts may lead to confusion and depersonalization-derealization via the mechanisms described above. Clearly this confusion, or identity satiation, could lead them to decide they are non-binary or trans, especially when combined with the amount of social recognition and social support that comes with identifying as such. There are many people who describe this happening to them, and who subsequently de-transitioned: "I never thought about my gender or had a problem with being a girl before".

Decades of psychological literature on neuroticism and mental illness, the well-established literature on rumination and mental health, and also the concepts discussed here, from cognitive psychology, all support the idea that the modern obsession with identity and self-knowledge is likely misguided and harmful. Persistent introspection - rumination - is the hallmark of many psychological disorders, and it may actually make self-knowledge more difficult.

While increased self-awareness and introspection are humanity's primary innovations over the other animals, it is an ability meant to be used sparingly and strategically. One's awareness should primarily directed outwards (entire schools of therapy are focused on teaching people how to turn their focus from inward facing to outward facing, in order to lessen distress and anxiety). We should not encourage young people–or anyone really–to spend inordinate amounts of time trying to consciously grasp who or what they are through pure introspection. Being an "ultra-social" animal, our identities are socially negotiated: it is from our social interactions and our natural interactions with the external world that we receive most of the information which informs our self-concept. Therefore, we should encourage young people to just be, and let their identity form through organic interactions with the world, through instinctive play and social interaction with others, and from only occasional introspection and exercises in 'self-knowing'.

For most people identity-formation is a sub-conscious process, and it should remain so.

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Culture/Politics

"Stigma" as social scaffolding of behaviour

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September 11, 2024

This week I summarise an article by one of my favorite modern philosophers, Joseph Heath. He is a heterodox leftist philosopher, with a strong grounding in technical, empirical knowledge of economics and psychology, not just philosophy.