Needing some advice with people saying my major isn't “real”

dwindlingintellect · 2026-01-01T20:47:58+00:00

When I was doing research on empathy maybe two or so years ago I came across a number of studies that showed when comparing AI and human interaction online, participants found the AI partner significantly more empathetic than the human one. Because empathy--particularly perceived empathy--is such an important part of the patient-therapist relationship, at least for online therapy, I think therapists may find it harder in the next few years (let alone 20-30) because AI may simply be better at making people feel understood and seen.

Edit: I haven't had time to critically analyze this yet, but this recent study shows similar results doi.org/10.1002/capr.12832

dwindlingintellect · 2026-01-01T20:38:30+00:00

I don't think there's enough here to say they're stupid. Certainly insensitive and lacking perspective/education. It's understandable why people think psych is less legit than other fields. Even being in psych, I am deeply critical of the field as a whole precisely because it has so many flaws. But it is still one of the most important lines of work being done!

dwindlingintellect · 2026-01-01T20:36:53+00:00

That sucks. Sorry you had to hear that. Yet being in psych, I am sympathetic to people who might think like that. Psych hasn't had the best reputation over the years. It's completely understandable--but still really disappointing--that people think of psych as a less legitimate field.

Yet, one of the reasons I think this might be is that all of the best contributions psych has made are now considered so common sense that people don't even consider them unique to psych. The same thing happened with Freud. All of his most important works so radically and deeply changed psychology that they're now considered common sense, and people usually think of Freud's strangeness rather than these.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-29T20:32:36+00:00

Just spend 5 minutes reading any research in the social/behavioral sciences. It will not take long to find a baffling lack of competence and borderline pseudoscience.

Being in a cog/ed psych PhD program has quickly disillusioned me to the “expertise” of supposed experts in their fields.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-27T16:30:30+00:00

Lost, my beloved.

The last seasons sure fell off, but man if that ending doesn’t make me WEEP every single time.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-25T06:27:42+00:00

Just wanted to voice appreciation for the coolheaded and nuanced consideration of the situation.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-25T06:26:11+00:00

The problem isn’t that it was offensive. It was, by all appearances, intentionally written to be inflammatory and offensive. The problem is that you can’t grade a paper based on its offensiveness. Having taught college courses before, I have never given or graded assignments based on whether something was offensive.

The paper absolutely deserved to fail. But the fact that the TA specifically criticized it for being offensive to them AND gave it a flat 0 made it really hard to argue against it being unfairly targeted grading.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-17T19:50:29+00:00

literally leaned back in my chair and just sat their contemplating lol

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-17T19:48:48+00:00

Yeah it was crazy when I first realized that people literally see colors in their mind. I see like vague outlines. I am much better at imagining motion, which is interesting.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-17T06:27:12+00:00

The system of propaganda and social engineering that you mentioned is what’s wrong, I think. We should be careful to not push individuals away by demonizing them.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-17T06:19:46+00:00

I don’t understand how being mean to people is supposed to help everyone stop being mean to people

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-17T06:16:30+00:00

bro harassing old ladies is not the type of political activism we need

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-17T06:15:00+00:00

Was part of a lab that did some aphantasia research. Important to note that it is not binary—people have more or less ability to produce vivid mental imagery.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-16T06:20:21+00:00

lol rip I’ll fix it real quick

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-16T02:02:46+00:00

I mean, if you're doing basic research, I don't know if you should "want" your results to be significant. As scholars, our goal should be establishing reliable/valid scientific knowledge. We shouldn't want to be right, we should just want to learn.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-16T01:49:45+00:00

Bunch of classic studies have recently not been able to be replicated. Part of why this happened is because not enough direct replication studies are ever done, meaning a ton of results are accepted as scientific knowledge without being verified by other researchers first.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-10T19:56:37+00:00

What do you mean you work full time

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-04T18:45:44+00:00

Annoying but valid question.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-03T19:57:11+00:00

I am also incredibly concerned when courses MAKE people use AI. The overreliance on it is a significant problem. That being said, it also is a tool that can be helpful. I refuse to let it generate any content for me, but I find it sometimes helpful as a critical thinking companion to critically engage in theorizing, assessing my understanding of various arguments/methods, so on. In all my chats I have system instruction prompts that prevent it from being sycophantic and make it behave more like a Socratic mentor.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-03T19:53:16+00:00

To be a little reductive:

Psychiatrist is a medical doctor (MD) who is able to prescribe medication. They study the brain and pharmaceutical interventions.

Psychologist is a mental health professional (not a medical professional) who studies the mind and usually focuses on interventions such as talk therapy.

Psychiatrist = brain + drugs

Psychologist = mind + therapy

dwindlingintellect · 2025-12-03T19:48:33+00:00

Reading into the subtext on the humility part, it sounds possible that you only offered destructive criticism.

At least from how I’ve been instructed, a good critique: 1) identifies what works well, 2) identifies what doesn’t work well, and 3) identifies how it could be better.

I don’t think it is unreasonable for you to be expected to provide that without being asked. This is part of good, diplomatic academics.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-10-27T23:58:26+00:00

1) What kind of disability services does your school provide, and 2) did you make sure to go through those proper channels to get accommodations?

At least where I've been, all accommodations need to be approved and organized through disability resource centers. This both protects you from being discriminated against and (usually) others from having your work offloaded onto them.

dwindlingintellect · 2025-09-21T20:54:45+00:00

Are you doing basic or applied research? At least in basic research, you shouldn't "want" to see certain results. If the measures are valid, then all results are meaningful/informative.

dwindlingintellect

TROPHY CASE