Posted by alexandra_k2 on December 20, 2005, at 19:19:41
In reply to Re: emotional encapsulation » alexandra_k2, posted by Dinah on December 20, 2005, at 18:00:16
> Well, I could say that vomit contamination can be cleaned. If I wanted to make others happy.
> But it can't. Once vomited on, forever contaminated.
Right. But you also have lots of other beliefs. I'm not sure that I have the knowledge (of decontamination) but I'll have a go...
You probably also have other beliefs about disinfectant. About how disinfectant can kill germs. Decontaminate things etc etc.
So the thought here is that the belief that 'once vomited on always contaminated' would conflict (run into contradiction with) other beliefs you have about how things get to be decontaminated.
of course... you can try and tell elaborate stories to remove the contradiction... sometimes people do this with delusional beliefs. they revise most everything else in their belief network so that the delusional belief does not conflict with any other belief. what is interesting is that they aren't prepared to reject the delusional belief in the face of 'inconsistency with everything the patient previously knew to be true' (Stone and Young, 1997) ie their other beliefs in the first place.
Of course... maybe there are two readings of 'contaminated'. one is scientific and the other is... feeling based???
thats my favourite strategy for removing contradiction :-)
> And... why can't the taste aversion have caused the nausea rather than be a result of it?
because...
rats. take a bunch of rats. actually two bunches of rats. they have never had sugar water before. rats typically like sugar water. (as do people i suppose). then you inject one group with some stuff that induces nausea. they drink the sugar water (a novel food) then experience nausea. after that (after a single pairing of novel food - nausea) they will not drink sugar water volountarily. they have developed a taste aversion (maybe disgust?) to it. the other group (the control group) got injected with saline or some placebo that does not induce nausea. they like the sugar water just fine :-)
poster:alexandra_k2
thread:590579
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20051216/msgs/590774.html