I just want to say that there are a lot of reasons why interfacing with someone in one context can work out well but not generalize to other contexts, and just because “this person experiences psychotic episodes” can explain this well, it does not mean that your guess of psychosis is actually correct.
You can just say: ”A lot of people I know who have had positive interactions with them in one context turns out to have had very bad interactions in other contexts. They also have a pattern of what I would consider erratic and unpredictable behavior. For example, ___. So I would be careful about these positive experiences and not take that to mean they will always respond positively.”
I don’t think the LW analogy tracks. There’s a difference between messaging someone (in private?) about a mental disorder they have publicly talked about and doing so with the intention of helping them, and speculating on someone’s mental health based on their behavior, with no intention of helping them.
I basically second all of Aaron’s comments about the harms of psychologizing—I can’t trust that everyone will use this with good intentions, I think it risks spreading harmful misinformation about people, I think the information transmitted can be vague and open to different interpretations.
One thing I disagree with is the predictive value—I don’t in fact think a bunch of nonexpert speculations on someone’s psychiatric diagnosis adds to predictive power. I think (as you mentioned earlier) focusing on examining the facts that lead you to the conclusion is more useful. If this was a medical forum filled only with psychiatrists that’d be a different story. But the potential harm and misunderstanding of people using loaded psychiatric terms in different ways and different intentions just seems clearly worse than focusing on describing the facts.
I just want to say that there are a lot of reasons why interfacing with someone in one context can work out well but not generalize to other contexts, and just because “this person experiences psychotic episodes” can explain this well, it does not mean that your guess of psychosis is actually correct.
You can just say:
”A lot of people I know who have had positive interactions with them in one context turns out to have had very bad interactions in other contexts. They also have a pattern of what I would consider erratic and unpredictable behavior. For example, ___. So I would be careful about these positive experiences and not take that to mean they will always respond positively.”
I don’t think the LW analogy tracks. There’s a difference between messaging someone (in private?) about a mental disorder they have publicly talked about and doing so with the intention of helping them, and speculating on someone’s mental health based on their behavior, with no intention of helping them.
I basically second all of Aaron’s comments about the harms of psychologizing—I can’t trust that everyone will use this with good intentions, I think it risks spreading harmful misinformation about people, I think the information transmitted can be vague and open to different interpretations.
One thing I disagree with is the predictive value—I don’t in fact think a bunch of nonexpert speculations on someone’s psychiatric diagnosis adds to predictive power. I think (as you mentioned earlier) focusing on examining the facts that lead you to the conclusion is more useful. If this was a medical forum filled only with psychiatrists that’d be a different story. But the potential harm and misunderstanding of people using loaded psychiatric terms in different ways and different intentions just seems clearly worse than focusing on describing the facts.