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June 6, 2006
Road rage 'a medical disorder' ?
Topics: Human Interest
Here's another one of those stories that give us a hint of what's wrong with our society, and it's not what these doctors think it is. Apparently, there's not a bad behavior or display of poor self control that some nutty doctor can't find a label for, and attempt to install it's use in society as a "medical" excuse for what is nothing more than the result of poor parenting and/or an individual's severe lack of self control because they're a jerk - not sick, just a jerk!!!
(Chicago) - To you, that angry, horn-blasting tailgater has road rage. But doctors have another name for it - intermittent explosive disorder - and a new study suggests it is far more common than they realised, affecting up to 16 million Americans."Intermittent Explosive Disorder"??? Please docs, give me a break and come back down to earth; that's no better a description than "intermittent episodes of truly bad behavior" or "jerk" disorder!"People think it's bad behaviour 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," said Dr Emil Coccaro, chairperson of psychiatry at the University of Chicago's medical school.
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.
By definition, intermittent explosive disorder involves multiple outbursts that are way out of proportion to the situation. These angry outbursts often include threats or aggressive actions and property damage.
The disorder typically first appears in adolescence; in the study, the average age of onset was 14.
The study was based on a national face-to-face survey of 9 282 US adults who answered diagnostic questionnaires in 2001-03.
My own not-so-national survey of zillions of adults over my lifetime and after having traveled all over the world from the Far East to the Middle East and everywhere in between, indicates that these docs are the ones that are nuts, and the adults in their samples are simply jerks displaying bad behavior because they're jerks (okay - admittedly my study may not be so scientific).
And their parents probably spent more time contemplating their own navels and having a good time then spending it with their kids. What do you think? No technical opinions please, the jerks don't deserve much more than being made fun of.
Posted by Richard at June 6, 2006 1:35 PM
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