Embodiment of sickness and disease Flashcards
What is embodiment?
Embodiment is the subjective experience of living with illness and disease. It is a product of the disease, and our social, cultural, and political environment. It’s saying that something that cannot be fully understood without living the disease itself. If you don’t have the disease, you can’t definitively say someone is not in pain, or that they are over-reacting/making it up.
What is a culture-bound syndrome? Give some examples?
A culture-bound syndrome is a set of both psychiatric and somatic symptoms that are generally recognised and accepted within members of a particular culture. For example, some Asian men have ‘Koro’ - a pathological belief that their penis is shrinking, despite no evidence.
Schizophrenia has been recognised as having symptoms that are reflective of the patient’s culture, and non-Western sufferers have a better prognosis. Other disorders, such as post-natal depression, bipolar, Chronic Fatigue, and possibly menopause can also be considered culture-bound syndromes.
How does suffering or distress become embodied as feelings or illness?
Illness is often a product of suffering or distress in broader social or political situations. At a base level, someone unemployed in sub-Saharan Africa may be unable to afford mosquito protection, and suffer from Malaria as a result. While this is a simple link, there are often very complex and convoluted social and political causes of illness.
What is the difference between cognitive and emotional empathy?
Cognitive empathy focuses on understanding without having emotional involvement - ‘I can imagine how that must feel’. Emotional empathy is more tied up in sympathy, with an emotional response ‘I feel what you feel’.
Cognitive empathy is much more appropriate for a doctor.
