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Play for health
Published in Julia Whitaker, Alison Tonkin, Play for Health Across the Lifespan, 2021
Until the mid-eighteenth century, the prevailing orthodox Christian view of the mind–body relationship was monistic: people were perceived as spiritual beings and the body and soul as a single substantial entity. This perspective prevented scientific exploration of the human body which was prohibited on religious grounds (Mehta 2011). The proposition by Rene Descartes, in 1749, that mind and body were in fact separate entities, ‘demythologized’ the physical body and legitimized the study of anatomy and physiology as part of medical science (ibid.). Mind–body dualism laid the basis for logical medical practice that was ‘based upon empirical i.e. unbiased, impersonal and unsympathetic observation and measurement’ (ibid.: 203). At the same time, the significance of the mind for an individual’s experience of health was negated and ‘the field of medicine, by adhering rigidly to scientific method, mislaid its subject matter and gave up its moral responsibility toward the real health concerns of human beings’ (ibid.: 203).
In support of physical literacy throughout life
Published in Margaret Whitehead, Physical Literacy across the World, 2019
Set out above briefly are pointers to the way philosophy legitimates attention to the human embodied dimension, and thus physical literacy. Legitimacy rests to a considerable extent on the rejection of dualism. This is supported by Claxton (1997), who dismisses mind–body dualism as ‘philosophically bankrupt and scientifically discredited’ (p. 223).
The disease: chronic myofascial pain
Published in Kirsti Malterud, Steinar Hunskaar, Chronic Myofascial Pain, 2018
Kirsti Malterud, Steinar Hunskaar
Until the early 1960s the current theory of pain generation and pain experience was unidimensional. This ‘biomedical’ model considered pain as a purely sensory-physical experience where identification of the somatic cause would ultimately result in treatment and resolution of the pain. If no somatic cause was identified, the problem was labelled ‘psychogenic’. This approach has its roots in the Cartesian mind-body dualism, whereby body and psyche are considered to be totally separate entities. The biomedical approach to chronic non-malignant pain proved ultimately to be fruitless.
From embodiment to emplacement: Toward understanding occupation as body-mind-environment
Published in Journal of Occupational Science, 2023
Antoine Bailliard, Susan Agostine, Stephanie Bristol, Ya-Cing Syu
Many cultural idioms (e.g., ‘mind over matter’) reinforce the mind-body dualism and cultural expressions romanticizing the idea of transcending one’s body (e.g., Thoreau’s Walden, Emerson’s Nature, the Wachowski brothers’ The Matrix) have galvanized its hold on our psyche (Cella, 2017). Yet, our everyday lived experiences are antithetical to it because life is experienced as a gestalt constituted by both mind and body in an inseparable union – not as ungrounded mind occupying a separate bodily vessel (Merleau-Ponty, 1964). Our sensory experiences of the environment (i.e., exteroception) and our internal bodily states (i.e., interoception) are inextricably linked to our cognitive processes and emotional regulation (Barrett & Simmons, 2015; Zamariola et al., 2019). Indeed, research across disciplines is increasingly challenging the conceptual foundations of the mind-body dualism in favor of the concepts of embodiment and emplacement. This paradigm shift shows significant promise for achieving new understandings of human behavior and participation in meaningful occupation.
A qualitative study of the experiences and perceptions of patients with functional motor disorder
Published in Disability and Rehabilitation, 2020
Glenn Nielsen, Marta Buszewicz, Mark J. Edwards, Fiona Stevenson
First was the perceived incompatibility between physical problems (such as tremor, weakness and gait disturbance) and psychological mechanisms. This mind-body dualistic way of thinking is not special to patients with functional symptoms but is embodied in society in general, including amongst health care professionals [23]. Mind-body dualism amongst the study participants may have been reinforced by being given overly simplistic psychological explanations (e.g. FMD is caused by stress) and explanations that failed to take physical precipitating events into account when they were an important part of the participant’s narrative. These findings point to the importance of listening to the patient’s story and the need for an integrated biopsychosocial explanatory model to help the patient make sense of their illness experience.
Brain–bladder axis: a case of anxiety-associated haematuria
Published in Psychiatry and Clinical Psychopharmacology, 2018
Yen-Feng Lee, Pei-Shen Ho, Chih-Sung Liang
The increasing understanding of the neural basis of mental symptoms has rendered mind–body dualism theoretically untenable. Symptoms, be they physical or psychiatric, could be considered products of the interconnection of bodily, mental, and environmental problems. Focusing on the interface between psychiatry and medicine, psychosomatic medicine has become a subspecialty of psychiatry. The major groups of patients in the field of psychosomatic medicine are those with somatoform disorders, those with comorbid psychiatric and general medical conditions complicating each other’s management, and those with psychiatric disorders resulting from the direct consequence of a medical condition or its treatment. In this vein, a psychosomatic medicine psychiatrist is like a medical-psychiatric detective, discovering the clues to psychosomatic patients, and improving their care.