Divorce rate

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So far what I'm getting from this thread is psychiatrists are usually more liberal, and not very likely to see marriage as some holy contract between god, woman, and man so they are more likely to break it off if things start to get rough, or not get married at all. But I would think a psychiatrist has the knowledge of conflict resolution and listening skills to stop things from going south. Guess not.
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OldPsychDoc said:
"Significant" depends on the confidence interval.
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The confidence interval is about 0.47, if we're using a confidence level of 0.95. I'm feeling too lazy to do a p-value calculation, but I'd say that with 29,025 physicians responding out of a population of 1,000,000, and given the confidence interval presented, the results would likely have a p-value indicating significance. I'm sure there's confounders, but that's what the whole thread is about- is the field different, or are psychiatrists different?
 
psychMDhopefully said:
So far what I'm getting from this thread is psychiatrists are usually more liberal, and not very likely to see marriage as some holy contract between god, woman, and man so they are more likely to break it off if things start to get rough, or not get married at all. But I would think a psychiatrist has the knowledge of conflict resolution and listening skills to stop things from going south. Guess not.
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I think it's a waste of time to generalize from these maybe/maybe not trends. Ultimately each couple is a unique blend of strengths and hangups and history, and the medical specialty of (one or both) is only one factor contributing to the fate of their relationship.

At least that's what Mrs.PsychDoc told me to say...and she's been tolerating me for 33 years.
 
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Would seem most likely to me any difference would be due to pre-existing risk factors for divorce that also play into someone choosing psychiatry. Things like having MDD or PTSD increases divorce rate significantly (20% increase or more) and there are plenty of psychiatrists who partially chose field due to family/personal hx. Also religion and political affiliation makes a huge difference in divorce rates and shrinks are less religious than the average doctor. Wouldn't surprise me if religion makes up the entire difference.

Also I haven't looked at stats, but I believe race is also a huge modifier to divorce risk, with Asians having the lowest risk and also anecdotally being less interested in becoming psychiatrists.
 
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I'm honored that I started a 100+ post thread, maybe this really is the field for me...
 
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Merely said:
I'm honored that I started a 100+ post thread, maybe this really is the field for me...
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Haha, it may be the field for you indeed! Psychiatry is often about steering the conversation toward the pain and you clearly struck one of SDN's collective nerves with your original post! :laugh:

Now for the follow-up: "So, SDN, I notice that normally you only respond with about 15 posts, but when I mentioned divorce you responded with about 100 posts in a day. Not to mention a lot of side arguments seemed to crop up that were unrelated to the original question... what do you think that's about?"
 
I don't mean to be really really rude, and this is going to perhaps be extremely offensive, buuuuut.......

To become a doctor you need high college entrance scores. This implies lots of study. I know a few people who decided they wanted to enter in to difficult college courses and succeeded. They sacrificed their teenage years to the books. Very limited or no social life. They were extremely self excluding from normal teenage social interaction.

Then you go to college. Or university. And these courses are not cake walks. There is lots of information and the requirement to apply that information and interpret it. It's not like fields such as engineering where there is nothing to interpret, there is just an exact equation.

Including classes and study time, if you want to achieve the results required to become a specialist, you could be studying for 50 hours a week with no time to play. You will not have time to invest in extra curricular interests and your social conversations may be limited to things like skin conditions as you have no other focus in life or area of interest to discuss on any meaningful level.

You could end up being 30 before you are qualified and have spent the last 15 years shut off from the world. No life experience and no casual social experience.

Why then is this person an expert on human social interaction? It makes sense why the divorce rate is so high. They have no social experience and are reliant on textbooks regarding the pathologization of human interaction to determine the appropriateness of their social interaction. It's completely removed from the real world and the normal boundaries of casual human interaction and socialisation.

If someone is the life of the party they might attempt to 'study' them and evaluate them as bipolar. It's really creepy to think someone is doing that to you. It might be why some people end the relationship. Too creepy.
 
maundy said:
I don't mean to be really really rude, and this is going to perhaps be extremely offensive, buuuuut.......

To become a doctor you need high college entrance scores. This implies lots of study. I know a few people who decided they wanted to enter in to difficult college courses and succeeded. They sacrificed their teenage years to the books. Very limited or no social life. They were extremely self excluding from normal teenage social interaction.

Then you go to college. Or university. And these courses are not cake walks. There is lots of information and the requirement to apply that information and interpret it. It's not like fields such as engineering where there is nothing to interpret, there is just an exact equation.

Including classes and study time, if you want to achieve the results required to become a specialist, you could be studying for 50 hours a week with no time to play. You will not have time to invest in extra curricular interests and your social conversations may be limited to things like skin conditions as you have no other focus in life or area of interest to discuss on any meaningful level.

You could end up being 30 before you are qualified and have spent the last 15 years shut off from the world. No life experience and no casual social experience.

Why then is this person an expert on human social interaction? It makes sense why the divorce rate is so high. They have no social experience and are reliant on textbooks regarding the pathologization of human interaction to determine the appropriateness of their social interaction. It's completely removed from the real world and the normal boundaries of casual human interaction and socialisation.

If someone is the life of the party they might attempt to 'study' them and evaluate them as bipolar. It's really creepy to think someone is doing that to you. It might be why some people end the relationship. Too creepy.
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If someone is this poorly balanced and driven, they probably are not very enjoyable to be in a relationship with to begin with.
NO ONE needs to be socially isolated and shut off from the world to enter medicine, and to be honest, I have no desire to have this kind of individual in a psychiatry training program either.
 
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maundy said:
I don't mean to be really really rude, and this is going to perhaps be extremely offensive, buuuuut.......

To become a doctor you need high college entrance scores. This implies lots of study. I know a few people who decided they wanted to enter in to difficult college courses and succeeded. They sacrificed their teenage years to the books. Very limited or no social life. They were extremely self excluding from normal teenage social interaction.

Then you go to college. Or university. And these courses are not cake walks. There is lots of information and the requirement to apply that information and interpret it. It's not like fields such as engineering where there is nothing to interpret, there is just an exact equation.

Including classes and study time, if you want to achieve the results required to become a specialist, you could be studying for 50 hours a week with no time to play. You will not have time to invest in extra curricular interests and your social conversations may be limited to things like skin conditions as you have no other focus in life or area of interest to discuss on any meaningful level.

You could end up being 30 before you are qualified and have spent the last 15 years shut off from the world. No life experience and no casual social experience.

Why then is this person an expert on human social interaction? It makes sense why the divorce rate is so high. They have no social experience and are reliant on textbooks regarding the pathologization of human interaction to determine the appropriateness of their social interaction. It's completely removed from the real world and the normal boundaries of casual human interaction and socialisation.

If someone is the life of the party they might attempt to 'study' them and evaluate them as bipolar. It's really creepy to think someone is doing that to you. It might be why some people end the relationship. Too creepy.
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You aren't really a physician are you? There is no way, and you don't sound like you are from America.
 
OldPsychDoc said:
If someone is this poorly balanced and driven, they probably are not very enjoyable to be in a relationship with to begin with.
NO ONE needs to be socially isolated and shut off from the world to enter medicine, and to be honest, I have no desire to have this kind of individual in a psychiatry training program either.
Click to expand...

Okay look at it like this:

College entrance scores for medicine are very high. You have to study even if naturally brilliant. 90% might not be enough. When most kids are experimenting with alcohol and at the mall, you're in your room studying. Because you know how high the marks are and are planning for it.

Go to college. 20-30 hours a week in classes. 20-30 hours a week at home studying.

You cannot afford to have a normal life. You also cannot maintain deep friendships with that commitment.

Look at your high school relationships five years after graduation. Where are they now? Liking posts on Facebook?

It's a fact of life. The commitment to be a doctor is very high. You must be very disciplined.

You can be a totally nice and decent person and come across as pleasant even with zero social skills.
 
maundy said:
I don't mean to be really really rude, and this is going to perhaps be extremely offensive, buuuuut.......

To become a doctor you need high college entrance scores. This implies lots of study. I know a few people who decided they wanted to enter in to difficult college courses and succeeded. They sacrificed their teenage years to the books. Very limited or no social life. They were extremely self excluding from normal teenage social interaction.

Then you go to college. Or university. And these courses are not cake walks. There is lots of information and the requirement to apply that information and interpret it. It's not like fields such as engineering where there is nothing to interpret, there is just an exact equation.

Including classes and study time, if you want to achieve the results required to become a specialist, you could be studying for 50 hours a week with no time to play. You will not have time to invest in extra curricular interests and your social conversations may be limited to things like skin conditions as you have no other focus in life or area of interest to discuss on any meaningful level.

You could end up being 30 before you are qualified and have spent the last 15 years shut off from the world. No life experience and no casual social experience.

Why then is this person an expert on human social interaction? It makes sense why the divorce rate is so high. They have no social experience and are reliant on textbooks regarding the pathologization of human interaction to determine the appropriateness of their social interaction. It's completely removed from the real world and the normal boundaries of casual human interaction and socialisation.

If someone is the life of the party they might attempt to 'study' them and evaluate them as bipolar. It's really creepy to think someone is doing that to you. It might be why some people end the relationship. Too creepy.
Click to expand...
I don't believe that this generalization is true... there are certainly creepy docs out there, but to say most physicians are anti-social/borderline isolated for 15 years is not accurate for *conjecture* the vast majority of physicians. Perhaps it's a God complex, perhaps it has to do with poor mate selection. But, to say that docs are just a bunch of creepy weirdos and thereby get divorced is a little far fetched, don't you think?
 
maundy said:
Okay look at it like this:

College entrance scores for medicine are very high. You have to study even if naturally brilliant. 90% might not be enough. When most kids are experimenting with alcohol and at the mall, you're in your room studying. Because you know how high the marks are and are planning for it.

Go to college. 20-30 hours a week in classes. 20-30 hours a week at home studying.

You cannot afford to have a normal life. You also cannot maintain deep friendships with that commitment.

Look at your high school relationships five years after graduation. Where are they now? Liking posts on Facebook?

It's a fact of life. The commitment to be a doctor is very high. You must be very disciplined.

You can be a totally nice and decent person and come across as pleasant even with zero social skills.
Click to expand...

This may or may not have been your experience. But, the reality is that many of us underwent a “normal” high school and college experience and made it, or dare I say ... thrive in medicine. You’re right though, not everyone can make it. Many of my friends studied longer and harder, but ran into obstacles that prevented this path from continuing. It is just the nature of things.
 
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DJ Khaled's Pet Tiger said:
I don't believe that this generalization is true... there are certainly creepy docs out there, but to say most physicians are anti-social/borderline isolated for 15 years is not accurate for *conjecture* the vast majority of physicians. Perhaps it's a God complex, perhaps it has to do with poor mate selection. But, to say that docs are just a bunch of creepy weirdos and thereby get divorced is a little far fetched, don't you think?
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You're doing 50 hours a week class time and home study to graduate. It's not far fetched. In such a high achieving field social time can include group study over pizza discussing aneurysms. It's scientific analysis and discussion, not socializing and downtime.
 
They lead perfectly fine alternative careers I might add. Several have a much more lucrative situation in comparison to me for the time being.
 
maundy said:
If someone is the life of the party they might attempt to 'study' them and evaluate them as bipolar. It's really creepy to think someone is doing that to you. It might be why some people end the relationship. Too creepy.
Click to expand...
No. This is not what happens. That you dated a creepy psychiatrist once is your problem, not psychiatry's.
 
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DisorderedDoc417 said:
This may or may not have been your experience. But, the reality is that many of us underwent a “normal” high school and college experience and made it, or dare I say ... thrive in medicine. You’re right though, not everyone can make it. Many of my friends studied longer and harder, but ran into obstacles that prevented this path from continuing. It is just the nature of things.
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What is considered a normal weekend for many is considered social event of the year for someone studying 50hrs per week. Your social value system is askew.

Christmas is only once a year.
 
Perhaps everyone here is being led under a bridge.... (;
 
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maundy said:
What is considered a normal weekend for many is considered social event of the year for someone studying 50hrs per week. Your social value system is askew.

Christmas is only once a year.
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That’s my point — I didn’t study 50 hrs a week, I just made your physics curve suck.
 
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DisorderedDoc417 said:
That’s my point — I didn’t study 50 hrs a week, I just made your physics curve suck.
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Oh. Well everyone I know, including class time, is over 40hrs per week all up. No time to work if you study full time.
 
maundy said:
You're doing 50 hours a week class time and home study to graduate. It's not far fetched. In such a high achieving field social time can include group study over pizza discussing aneurysms. It's scientific analysis and discussion, not socializing and downtime.
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Still don't buy it. I have plenty of friends currently in medical school that are very successful and can hold wonderful, non-medical conversations. I do believe you might be on to something for students who are just barely passing medical school. To be fair, most of my friends and I all share the luxury of earning near 4.0 GPAs while not stressing all that much. In fact, I probably wouldn't enter medicine if I felt I couldn't maintain healthy relationships with others because of it.

Maybe the issue is we're telling borderline students that it's important they throw away everything important in life - family, friends, other core values - in exchange for a career. Maybe many students in psychiatry are those same borderline students (based on competitiveness of the field ONLY. Some of my favorite authors and people are psychiatrists, and I in fact also want to be a psychiatrist). BUT, I stand my ground that most physicians are perfectly normal, social human beings.
 
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DJ Khaled's Pet Tiger said:
Still don't buy it. I have plenty of friends currently in medical school that are very successful and can hold wonderful, non-medical conversations. I do believe you might be on to something for students who are just barely passing medical school. To be fair, most of my friends and I all share the luxury of earning near 4.0 GPAs while not stressing all that much. In fact, I probably wouldn't enter medicine if I felt I couldn't maintain healthy relationships with others because of it.

Maybe the issue is we're telling borderline students that it's important they throw away everything important in life - family, friends, other core values - in exchange for a career. Maybe many students in psychiatry are those same borderline students (based on competitiveness of the field ONLY. Some of my favorite authors and people are psychiatrists, and I in fact also want to be a psychiatrist). BUT, I stand my ground that most physicians are perfectly normal, social human beings.
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At school med students definitely have a different air around them, and I know more than a few. They study, do not mix with others and do not partake in the usual young people things.

They have no time. They're not coming to feed the swans at the lake and drink cheap wine. They're in their dorms.

They can have a normal conversation if it is about the weather, what food to order or something else, but not if it's about sports, politics beyond the headlines, philosophy or anything really.

You can't refute it. Everyone knows it's like that.
 
Y'all need to stop responding to maundy. She derailed the dating thread and got it closed. The same pattern is happening here.

Back on topic, working in psychiatry has made me less tolerant of interpersonal conflict in my own personal life. Working through conflicts, dealing with passive aggression, and trying to read between the lines...UGH I don't want to take my work life home.

Psychiatry anecdotally attracts a disproportionate number of gay men. I wonder if the elevated divorce rate in the NEJM study partially reflected gay men coming out and their marriages ending.
 
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uname943 said:
Y'all need to stop responding to maundy. She derailed the dating thread and got it closed. The same pattern is happening here.

Back on topic, working in psychiatry has made me less tolerant of interpersonal conflict in my own personal life. Working through conflicts, dealing with passive aggression, and trying to read between the lines...UGH I don't want to take my work life home.

Psychiatry anecdotally attracts a disproportionate number of gay men. I wonder if the elevated divorce rate in the NEJM study partially reflected gay men coming out and their marriages ending.
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That thread did not get disclosed because of me.

I don't like you using the authority of the forum governance to attempt to silence my perfectly acceptable and justified reporting. Inciting communal group-think against me is a reflection of your character, and nothing else. I also have no idea how you are able to place such a high value on your self determined position within internet social hierarchy and ability to influence the board.

There is absolutely nothing wrong or incorrect about what I am posting.

But there is definitely something wrong with your social skills and attempts to impose social exclusion of valid points that you happen to disagree with.

In the Soviet Union that was called revisionism. And led to death sentences.
 
maundy said:
At school med students definitely have a different air around them, and I know more than a few. They study, do not mix with others and do not partake in the usual young people things.

They have no time. They're not coming to feed the swans at the lake and drink cheap wine. They're in their dorms.

They can have a normal conversation if it is about the weather, what food to order or something else, but not if it's about sports, politics beyond the headlines, philosophy or anything really.

You can't refute it. Everyone knows it's like that.
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What med school has students still living in dorms?
 
The one where you have to have a scholarship or a rich daddy.

Or live close by.
 
maundy said:
At school med students definitely have a different air around them, and I know more than a few. They study, do not mix with others and do not partake in the usual young people things.

They have no time. They're not coming to feed the swans at the lake and drink cheap wine. They're in their dorms.

They can have a normal conversation if it is about the weather, what food to order or something else, but not if it's about sports, politics beyond the headlines, philosophy or anything really.

You can't refute it. Everyone knows it's like that.
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I can absolutely refute it. Lol. We all just went wine tasting last weekend.
 
DJ Khaled's Pet Tiger said:
I can absolutely refute it. Lol. We all just went wine tasting last weekend.
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That's not normal 20 year old behavior.

That's like either really rich, sophisticated, pretentious or nerdy.

That's not normal contemporary young people activity.

More power to you, but it reinforces my argument.

That's not reflected on MTV. That is not mainstream. I don't want to call it weird because it's not, but it's definitely not a regular 20-something leisure activity. It is very DIFFERENT. People would not think about that as a normal activity on Spring Break. If you went around advertising you did that and it was esteemed and fit with the type of person you are, you would not fit in to most social groups. It is very unusual.
 
maundy said:
That's not normal 20 year old behavior.

That's like either really rich, sophisticated, pretentious or nerdy.

That's not normal contemporary young people activity.

More power to you, but it reinforces my argument.

That's not reflected on MTV. That is not mainstream. I don't want to call it weird because it's not, but it's definitely not a regular 20-something leisure activity. It is very DIFFERENT. People would not think about that as a normal activity on Spring Break. If you went around advertising you did that and it was esteemed and fit with the type of person you are, you would not fit in to most social groups. It is very unusual.
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Hahahaha. Look. I played high level athletics through college, the rest of my friends were either in sororities or other social clubs, we all frequent bars and other fun things to do. Your argument has no merit and for you to call us nerds because we went to a vineyard and had a bunch of cheap wine is hilariously ignorant.
 
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vNtYKoK.jpg
 
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maundy said:
That's not normal 20 year old behavior.

That's like either really rich, sophisticated, pretentious or nerdy.

That's not normal contemporary young people activity.

More power to you, but it reinforces my argument.

That's not reflected on MTV. That is not mainstream. I don't want to call it weird because it's not, but it's definitely not a regular 20-something leisure activity. It is very DIFFERENT. People would not think about that as a normal activity on Spring Break. If you went around advertising you did that and it was esteemed and fit with the type of person you are, you would not fit in to most social groups. It is very unusual.
Click to expand...
What 20 year old is in med school? They couldn't go to a wine tasting anyway.
 
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maundy said:
That's not normal 20 year old behavior.

That's like either really rich, sophisticated, pretentious or nerdy.

That's not normal contemporary young people activity.

More power to you, but it reinforces my argument.

That's not reflected on MTV. That is not mainstream. I don't want to call it weird because it's not, but it's definitely not a regular 20-something leisure activity. It is very DIFFERENT. People would not think about that as a normal activity on Spring Break. If you went around advertising you did that and it was esteemed and fit with the type of person you are, you would not fit in to most social groups. It is very unusual.
Click to expand...

U wut m8? Wine tasting is the ****.
 
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Yeah I don't get why people are responding to someone that has been blocked.
 
maundy said:
That's not normal 20 year old behavior.

That's like either really rich, sophisticated, pretentious or nerdy.

That's not normal contemporary young people activity.

More power to you, but it reinforces my argument.

That's not reflected on MTV. That is not mainstream. I don't want to call it weird because it's not, but it's definitely not a regular 20-something leisure activity. It is very DIFFERENT. People would not think about that as a normal activity on Spring Break. If you went around advertising you did that and it was esteemed and fit with the type of person you are, you would not fit in to most social groups. It is very unusual.
Click to expand...

Wow, this person was so borderline. Thank God someone banned her.
 
Let's not gravedance, and please let's not use "borderline" as an epithet for "person who made me angry".
 
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