Abnormality: Personal View Personal View

Abnormality: Personal View

Personal View of Abnormality

An approach to abnormality begins with an exploration of normality. Abnormality can only be defined in opposition to normality. Put differently, the more normality is understood, the easier it becomes to distinguish clearly what is abnormal. In the field of psychology, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV TR) (2000) is an essential reference for considering what behaviors, thoughts, and feelings may be considered abnormal.

What does "normal" mean? It can mean the usual, the socially acceptable, the familiar, the predictable, the healthy, and such. What is important to notice is that all these categories are in general culturally determined. In other words, different cultures may have different assessments of what is usual, familiar, socially adaptive, predictable, and harmless. These norms are often dependent on alternative notions of morality. They are influenced by belief and value systems. In one culture, for example, it might be usual for women to avoid wearing shorts, while in a different culture it might be usual and common for women to practice wearing shorts. Surrounding these two different norms might be constellations of moral and social rules (traditions) that rely on competing worldviews. Normal behavior is socially reinforced. Breaking those rules and traditions can lead to negative punishment for abnormal behavior. In the one case, a woman who wears shorts might be punished, while in the opposite case a woman who does not wear shorts might be censured. The point is that "normal" is culture-specific and value-based much of the time. So any discussion of what is normal ought to be aware of the target culture that is being addressed. This ought to make one wary of applying any universal standard of normality/abnormality that risks being insensitive to cultural and moral nuances.

If we speak of behavior then, normal is behavior that is usual, socially acceptable, familiar, predictable, and harmless. This may be considered the rule. Any behavior that is unusual, socially maladaptive, unfamiliar, unpredictable, and dangerous is potentially abnormal. To judge whether or not someone's actions are abnormal, these criteria can be used with relative confidence. However, they are not failsafe. They are general guidelines that must be applied to a concrete situation cautiously with awareness of the full context. Take smoking cigarettes. While it is unhealthy, it may be usual, familiar, predictable, and socially acceptable. On its own, smoking does not typically fall into the category of abnormal. However, taking a lit cigarette and burning someone else with it may certainly be considered abnormal, even in societies where smoking is acceptable. What makes this behavior abnormal is that it is a violent infraction of the other person's body, provided the person is unwilling to suffer burning and there are no cultural traditions at play (such as a "burning festival" during whose time such normally prohibited behavior becomes specially sanctioned). What constitutes it as abnormal are the social rules about rights to protect one's own body from harm and moral strictures against violence and imposing one's will upon another. Should these rules be different in another culture, then the behavior may be deemed normal rather than abnormal. It is a matter of cultural perspective. It is also situational. In one culture, it may be deemed a form of just punishment to burn someone else for breaking a law. In such a case, the punishing behavior would be considered appropriate. Cultural context is of utmost importance for the determination of normal or abnormal action.

Normal can also mean the frequent. This assumes that how a majority of people in a society act, think, and feel is normal (usual, acceptable, familiar, and healthy). However, statistical evidence for what is normal can be misleading. Statistics do not always reflect changing social norms. For instance, smoking is less acceptable now than fifty years ago in the West. If a behavior falls statistically outside the norm, it is not necessarily abnormal in a psychological sense. Someone may engage in risky behavior more than most of the population, but that does not automatically qualify their behavior as abnormal. Rock climbing is dangerous and statistically few people engage in this behavior. Yet few would consider it socially unacceptable in individualistic cultures (even if they assess it as unusual and dangerous). What would be abnormal, however, is a person who rock climbs naked, since in that case they are going against even the accepted "norms" of the rock climbing community (provided they are not part of a nudist rock climbing group where such behavior could be deemed appropriate).

To take another example: depression and anxiety disorders are common in U.S. society. They are not dominant, but they are frequent enough to question whether they are abnormal from a statistical perspective. If one decides statistically that depressive behavior is not abnormal, one is left to search other criteria. Is depression familiar or unfamiliar? Is depression socially acceptable or socially maladaptive? Does it place the person in conflict with their surroundings with such intensity as to be viewed as distressful to the individual or dangerous to society, and thus as abnormal? This is the kind of process one has to think through when considering issues of at-risk behavior or thought patterns.

To reach the level of pathology, deviant (abnormal) behavior is often repeated or habitual rather than a singular occurrence. Pathology happens when deviance (abnormality) continues its process repetitively. For example, an unacceptable behavior, thought, or feeling that occurs just once typically does not attain the level of pathological deviance. It is an isolated act which, while abnormal, is nonetheless not necessarily a pathological pattern.

How does one actually decide about what is abnormal? One must apply the criteria of abnormality (given above) with cultural and situational sensitivity. I can use my own history as an example. Born in the 1960's, I am the youngest of three girls. I was educated in a private catholic girls-only college. I was raised to believe that any behavior that was considered illegal or non-Christian was "abnormal." Despite being taught tolerance, I tended to be judgmental of others whose behavior did not match what I considered appropriate given my Christian values. For example, smoking, dancing, gambling, and pre-marital sex were abnormal for me. Not only were they not part of my environment and experience growing up, these activities were prohibited to me by the value system I was taught. As a result, I thought they were abnormal, even unethical. Now I realize that these behaviors can be normal, not abnormal, for me and for others. I realize that they need not be unusual, unfamiliar, socially unacceptable, and dangerous, nor even unethical (although they can be). I feel as though it is important, because of what I have argued, that I try to keep an open mind when assessing such behaviors. I will be better able to determine true abnormality if I am aware of differences in people's backgrounds and cultures.