The Great Myths of Psychology

In the 22nd Century, historians will look back on the "science" of psychology and laugh and laugh at our quaint beliefs. They'll also be amused at our economic theories, because their economics will be managed by Globovac, the Overlord of Earth. But that's a topic for another post.

Anyway, the reason I bring this up is to highlight an article I read over at Cracked.com--6 Bullshit Facts About Psychology That Everyone Believes. As a parent, my favorite has to be the one on the self-esteem crap the schools like to push on our kids. Here's an excerpt (money line is at the end):

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Even elementary schools jumped on board and started giving self-esteem classes to kids, because as all Americans know, the key to happiness is constant rewards for little to no actual accomplishments.

Why it is Bullshit:

This seems to be one of those deals where they've confused correlation and causation. Rather than thinking, "Maybe kids with high self-esteem feel good about themselves because they get good grades in school and have lots of friends," they decided that it's the other way around, that they succeed because they have self-esteem. So they tried to teach people to feel good about themselves for no other reason than pure entitlement, figuring the actual reasons for feeling good about themselves would follow at some later date.

This results in some kids having too much self-esteem, a breed of human that scientists classify as "douchebag."

We're not kidding. Research shows kids who have an inflated sense of self-worth become aggressive when their sense of superiority is called into question, leading to a more damaging fall for little Billy when he realizes what a loser he is (whereas fat Ralph already knew himself to be a loser and is therefore immune to disappointment).

We're certainly not experts, but it would, you know, seem like the solution would be to teach the stuff that leads to success (like social and communication skills, better strategies at dealing with stress, etc.) and just let that lead naturally to success and thus self-esteem, rather than just bypassing all that and going right for the self-esteem part.

Mr. Miyagi didn't teach the Karate Kid to believe in himself. He taught him how to kick people in the fucking head.

Pat Morita needed no self-esteem training. "Get your own, Daniel-san! And sit on it, Fonzie!"

***Gratuitously Tangential Update***

Bob Newhart played psychologist Bob Hartley on The Bob Newhart Show. In the episode, "Bob and Emily and Howard and Carol and Jerry", Bob was joined by guest stars James "Lo Pan" Hong and Pat "Arnold" Morita: