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Who first called it a 'phobia of movement'?

Forbin

Senior Member
Messages
966
I'm sure this is not what your looking for, but, by Googling, I found the phrase "phobia of movement" in a 1916 psychology book written by Sándor Ferenczi, a colleague of Freud. It has nothing to do with exercise phobia.

The context is all very Freudian, but it seems to be discussing the repression of aggression leading to a "phobia of movement."
Another neurotic symptom, which may be observed much more frequently, is exaggerated calm and grave precision in the carrying out of every action, or every movement, shewn also in the whole attitude and in the dread of all hurry and haste. It is usually accompanied with pronounced antipathy against those people who "let themselves go" easily, who are immodest, hasty, lively, unthinking and frivolous. One here might speak of a phobia of movement. This symptom is a reaction-formation against a strong, but suppressed, motor tendency to aggression.
Contributions to Psycho-analysis
By Sándor Ferenczi

I should point out that, in the same paragraph, Ferenczi boldy connects a low aptitude for geometry with the repression of over-exuberant fantasies about incest. :wide-eyed:
 
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A.B.

Senior Member
Messages
3,780
Psychoanalysis starts making sense when you know that Freud was severely abusing cocaine while writing many of his texts on the topic. To the point he required nose surgery.

But Freud carried on with his studies, consuming extraordinary amounts of cocaine in the name of scientific research. Ignoring evidence that he was falling prey to the drug, he simply loved the way it made him feel. His realization that the white powder made him talk endlessly about repressed memories made it an integral part of a toxic version of what he would later call the "talking cure." By 1895, he was abusing so much cocaine that he experienced serious heart pain, depression and difficulty concentrating. His nose was so congested that he required surgery to have a hole cut in the swollen linings of his nostrils.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/opinions/outlook/whats-in-a-name/freud.html

Anyway, the idea of CFS being some sort of exercise phobia has nothing to do with psychoanalysis. It's related to the fear avoidance model where the treatment is Graded Exposure Therapy.
 
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Effi

Senior Member
Messages
1,496
Location
Europe
@JaimeS I would say this paper from 1990 could be it. All later work on movement phobia refers to it. I couldn't find the full paper though.
Kori SH, Miller RP, Todd DD. Kinesiophobia: A new view of chronic pain behavior. Pain Management. 1990;3:35–43.

A quote from a paper that refers to the Kori paper:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3592098/ said:
This type of attitude is referred to in literature as kinetophobia or kinesiophobia. Kori et al. (1990) defined kinesiophobia as irrational, weakening and devastating fear of movement and activity stemming from the belief of fragility and susceptibility to injury. These authors proposed a questionnaire aiming to diagnose kinesiophobia: The Tampa Scale of Kinesiophobia.

A more recent paper with some more info on Kori:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3154068/
Kinesiophobia is a term that was introduced by Miller, Kori and Todd in 1990 at the Ninth Annual Scientific Meeting of the American Pain Society and describes a situation where “a patient has an excessive, irrational, and debilitating fear of physical movement and activity resulting from a feeling of vulnerability to painful injury or reinjury.”1,3 The Tampa Scale for Kinesiophobia (TSK) is a 17 item questionnaire used to assess the subjective rating of kinesiophobia or fear of movement.1,4,5 The original questionnaire was developed to “discriminate between non-excessive fear and phobia among patients with chronic musculoskeletal pain.”3,4
 
Messages
3,263
@JaimeS - This talks about "fear avoidance beliefs" - whatever that means! :confused: - I don't know if this is the same as "phobia of movement" - http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(14)00069-8/abstract
I'd only just noticed that - "fear avoidance beliefs". Sort of a hybrid between a behaviorual phenomenon (the avoidance of things that we fear part) and a cognitive one (the belief part). Clearly, our problem isn't just that we avoid behaviours or situations that we fear. No, its much more meta. Our problem is that we also believe that we should avoid these behaviours. Presumably it would not be so dysfucntional just to do the avoiding without giving it much thought. We make it so much worse by believing in the avoiding that we do.

Have I got that right?
 
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A.B.

Senior Member
Messages
3,780
Have I got that right?

I suspect a desirable element of these ideas is that they are vague. They don't commit to one clear interpretation. The concept is supposed to be flexible. In part because that makes it harder to criticize, and allows them to claim that critics just misunderstand it. In part because like the language of fortune telling, it's supposed to appear profound while actualy being so shallow to be applicable to wide variety of people and situations. There's even a specific term for this kind of language but it's rarely used (no it's not weasel words).

Edit: and finally, in part also because they're making shit up as they go, driven more by belief that they already "know" the answer and just need to fill in the details.
 

JaimeS

Senior Member
Messages
3,408
Location
Silicon Valley, CA
I'm sure this is not what your looking for, but, by Googling, I found the phrase "phobia of movement" in a 1916 psychology book written by Sándor Ferenczi, a colleague of Freud. It has nothing to do with exercise phobia.

The context is all very Freudian, but it seems to be discussing the repression of aggression leading to a "phobia of movement."


I should point out that, in the same paragraph, Ferenczi boldy connects a low aptitude for geometry with the repression of over-exuberant fantasies about incest. :wide-eyed:

So reading that, what I read is, "people who seem overly controlled and seem to have strong disapproval for expression through the body may be holding in bodily aggression themselves."

I mean, okay.

And then the incest because to Freud, every action, thought and feeling is sex always, usually culturally-illicit sex. :rolleyes:

-J
 

JaimeS

Senior Member
Messages
3,408
Location
Silicon Valley, CA
@JaimeS I would say this paper from 1990 could be it. All later work on movement phobia refers to it. I couldn't find the full paper though.


A quote from a paper that refers to the Kori paper:


A more recent paper with some more info on Kori:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3154068/

Effi, you are a love. This is basically what I was looking for. I had a 'friend' search sci-hub, and it appears that the original 1990 paper is irretrievable.


I recognize the authors there. The abstract is dazzling in its illogic. Here are the points they make in order.

  • PW CFS and FM have significant pain and worsening of symptoms on or after exertion.
  • This causes an understandable wariness of exertion.
  • Despite that, we have pathologized this 'understandable' behavior and invented a questionnaire to measure it.
  • Our study showed that fear of movement correlates to severity of symptoms: the worse your symptoms, the more you fear exertion
  • Treatment with GET requires identifying these patients who are worst off and tailoring GET and CBT programs for them.
I think you leaned all your weight on the trick step of exercise being the answer to life, the universe, and everything, and fell straight through...

Did you hear that? What on EARTH is wrong with their logic circuits?

One must assume that the whole 'this is understandable' nonsense is to appease patients or soft-hearted clinicians; no one could really understand the pain and relapse created by exercise and push it, anyway. There is no long-term gain (as demonstrated in PACE) and there is often long-term loss. What is this worship of exercise all about? They admit it causes patients to worsen in the bloody abstract, but apparently it's worth it to crash on day 2 so long as exercise is achieved on day 1.

Sorry, but my brain just can't handle the contradictions here.

I know the answer is money. No one has to inform me. Sorry. :oops:

Clearly, our problem isn't just that we avoid behaviours or situations that we fear. No, its much more meta. Our problem is that we also believe that we should avoid these behaviours. Presumably it would not be so dysfucntional just to do the avoiding without giving it much thought. We make it so much worse by believing in the avoiding that we do.

All these researchers appear totally unfamiliar with the 24 hour lag many patients experience between exercise and problems. I guess it takes that long for the belief we should have been injured to 'fully sink in'.

I have actually really wondered about that one. I think that even with the 'flexibility' @A.B. mentions, that one isn't explicable within the BS...ahem... BPS model. Patients still try so hard to move/exercise if it's at all within their capabilities, and often suffer about 24 hours later.

-J
 

frog_in_the_fog

Test Subject
Messages
253
Location
California
I experienced kinesiophobia when I hurt my back, it took me quite a while to start moving again. If you think it is going to hurt, you don't want to move. I think many of us have a fear of overexertion, only this fear is actually well founded.
 

Mary

Moderator Resource
Messages
17,335
Location
Southern California
  • PW CFS and FM have significant pain and worsening of symptoms on or after exertion.
  • This causes an understandable wariness of exertion.
  • Despite that, we have pathologized this 'understandable' behavior and invented a questionnaire to measure it.
  • Our study showed that fear of movement correlates to severity of symptoms: the worse your symptoms, the more you fear exertion
  • Treatment with GET requires identifying these patients who are worst off and tailoring GET and CBT programs for them.

These papers remind me of the Olympics - dizzying feats of irrationality, effortlessly scaling the heights of absurdity, with unbelievable twists and turns and backflips and somehow they land on their feet! - (with apologies to the real athletes! :rolleyes:)
 

Groggy Doggy

Guest
Messages
1,130
Effi, you are a love. This is basically what I was looking for. I had a 'friend' search sci-hub, and it appears that the original 1990 paper is irretrievable.



I recognize the authors there. The abstract is dazzling in its illogic. Here are the points they make in order.

  • PW CFS and FM have significant pain and worsening of symptoms on or after exertion.
  • This causes an understandable wariness of exertion.
  • Despite that, we have pathologized this 'understandable' behavior and invented a questionnaire to measure it.
  • Our study showed that fear of movement correlates to severity of symptoms: the worse your symptoms, the more you fear exertion
  • Treatment with GET requires identifying these patients who are worst off and tailoring GET and CBT programs for them.
I think you leaned all your weight on the trick step of exercise being the answer to life, the universe, and everything, and fell straight through...

Did you hear that? What on EARTH is wrong with their logic circuits?

One must assume that the whole 'this is understandable' nonsense is to appease patients or soft-hearted clinicians; no one could really understand the pain and relapse created by exercise and push it, anyway. There is no long-term gain (as demonstrated in PACE) and there is often long-term loss. What is this worship of exercise all about? They admit it causes patients to worsen in the bloody abstract, but apparently it's worth it to crash on day 2 so long as exercise is achieved on day 1.

Sorry, but my brain just can't handle the contradictions here.

I know the answer is money. No one has to inform me. Sorry. :oops:



All these researchers appear totally unfamiliar with the 24 hour lag many patients experience between exercise and problems. I guess it takes that long for the belief we should have been injured to 'fully sink in'.

I have actually really wondered about that one. I think that even with the 'flexibility' @A.B. mentions, that one isn't explicable within the BS...ahem... BPS model. Patients still try so hard to move/exercise if it's at all within their capabilities, and often suffer about 24 hours later.

-J

Yep, they are trying to compare ME to a 'fear of heights' or a 'fear of flying' psychological illness. And we somehow use our minds to create our real physical symptoms. But they never fully explain how ME people magically create these physical symptoms "on demand". They act as though its a switch we can turn off and on when we desire. As far I as know we have a sympathetic and parasympathic systems. They are decribing something that does't exist, a new voodoo sympathetic system.

For me, it's not so much that we have people making up study outcomes to support the theories of the organizations who are paying for the study. This is a given, and nothing new. It's the people that read the voodoo studies that actually believe them, that concerns me even more.