Empathy and other psychology terms that we often confuse and use incorrectly

It is sometimes hard to find the right words, especially in science. Not only do the same words mean completely different things, whether you use them in casual conversation or in a scientific context, but the more we use certain words and phrases, the faster they can lose their original meaning or become so simplistic that in the end they will just be wrong.

And the worst thing is that not only amateurs, but also specialists, such as scientists, researchers, graduate students, teachers and lecturers, confuse the concepts of certain terms in science, and this can be very dangerous when you work in a field that relies on truth and facts.

1. Empathy, sympathizing and sympathy

Because of the similar sound, "empathy" is often confused with "sympathy". Empathy is the ability to understand the experiences of another person, and you do not have to like him. And sympathy is the next step after empathy, saying that you not only appreciated someone's emotions, but were able to try them on yourself.
2. Shame and guilt

Both unpleasant feelings arise as a response to a mistake. But shame is characteristic of a person who has committed an offense in front of witnesses, and is associated with public condemnation. It manifests itself in the form of a negative assessment of one's own personality. Guilt arises whether or not someone saw the error. These are remorse of conscience associated with a negative assessment of one's act.
3. Displacement (repression) and venting

It is easy to confuse the two defense mechanisms of the psyche, but you should not do this. Repression, or suppression, is the removal of something unpleasant from consciousness. At the everyday level, it manifests itself as attempts to get distracted, to forget, although in general the process is somewhat more complicated. Venting consists in reorienting the emotion from the object that caused it to another one, because its true direction needs to be hidden for some reason. For example, a person is angry with his boss but yells at his family members.
4. Negative reinforcement and punishment

It seems to many people that these are almost synonymous concepts, but the terms are based on directly opposite strategies. Punishment involves limiting pleasurable stimuli. For example, a child who has not cleaned the room is not allowed to have a walk. Moreover, the result of punishment is unpredictable: it is not known whether it will work or not.

Negative reinforcement, on the contrary, accompanies the removal of an unpleasant or irritating factor and motivates a person to do the same again when similar conditions arise.

For example, the child was not allowed to have a walk, and he burst into tears. The parent felt sorry for him, and he canceled the punishment. By doing this, he gave the offspring negative reinforcement, and in the future the child will repeatedly use crying to achieve his goals.
5. Depression and discouragement

It is high time to forbid mentioning depression at all: you don’t need to call bad mood and fatigue that way. This is a serious disease, the causes of which can be an imbalance of neurotransmitters in the brain, endocrine changes, brain damage, severe traumatic events, and so on. A person with depression needs medical help. Instead, he often receives comments like “I don’t have time to get depressed, I have a lot to do” and “go somewhere, have fun.” And the reasons for this are the use of the name of the disease with or without reason.
6. Sociopathy and social phobia

The person with social phobia is afraid of the company of other people, he is afraid of talking to strangers, and mass events. But at the same time, he does not pose a danger to others. A sociopath is not afraid of society; he despises it and shows it with all his actions. He does not take into account the rules and norms of morality. Communicating with him is at least uncomfortable (he will say unpleasant things to you without a second thought), and in the most dangerous case: a sociopath will easily take advantage of you to achieve his goals.
7. Serial murder and mass murder

A serial killer commits several crimes, but they are separated in time. A new incident is preceded by a "cooling off period", when the killer experiences an emotional decline, as he did not receive the expected satisfaction from his actions. Mass murder (massacre) is the killing of a large number of people in one or more episodes, but almost at the same time.
8. Asociality and antisociality

An asocial person experiences indifference to society, he does not want to interact with its members and goes through life alone. The anti-social individual knows the laws of society quite well and seeks to counteract them. Among the common signs of antisocial behavior are lying, tendency to fight and robbery, arson, vandalism.
9. Depressive-manic syndrome

Since 1993, this disease has been more correctly called bipolar affective disorder. However, the former name still serves it a disservice. Uninformed people present a person with bipolar disorder as a kind of depressive maniac, although in reality manic disorder has nothing to do with serial killers. Periods of depression in this state alternate with an upbeat, cheerful mood, when a person is ready to move mountains, which is called mania.
10. Prostration and frustration

Prostration is a state of severe fatigue, exhaustion, lack of physical and mental strength. The reasons for this can be a serious illness, overwork, starvation. Frustration - anxiety and sadness due to the fact that you did not get what you wanted, especially if you were sure of success.
11. Procrastination and laziness

Both of these states are similar in that a person puts everything off until later, does not want to do anything right now. Only procrastination is accompanied by a sense of anxiety due to unfulfilled obligations, and a lazy person is not really tormented by remorse.
12. Psychosis and neurosis

In everyday life these concepts are used to name strong excitement, an excited state, and in both cases this is not true. Psychosis is a disorder of perception of the real world with painful reflection on oneself, delusions, hallucinations and reactions that contradict the situation. Neurosis is a collective name for neurotic disorders that are characterized by obsessive or hysterical manifestations, decreased performance.
13. Schizophrenia and split personality

These terms are rarely confused by ordinary people, problems may arise for those who like to dig deeper. The name "schizophrenia" comes from the Greek words "split the mind", but this does not mean that the patient has a split personality. In fact, the behavior and thoughts of a schizophrenic do not fit in with the environment around him, that is, his personality is split with reality, and not with itself.
14. Narcissist

Usually the word "narcissist" means "vain", "selfish", or "self-obsessed": "Zoomers are such narcissists, they always take selfies!" "Oh, this politician is a narcissist, always takes credit for everything and needs to stroke his ego."

Much of this is just a common reference to the mythological character Narcissus, who stared at his reflection for so long that he died. But there is a clinical diagnosis defined by the DSM-5 as "a pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy, beginning in early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts."

Narcissistic personality disorder is a personality disorder characterized by a belief in one's own uniqueness, special position, superiority over other people, grandiosity; inflated opinion about one’s talents and achievements; preoccupation with fantasies about their successes; expectation of an unconditionally good attitude and unquestioning obedience from others; seeking the admiration of others to confirm one's uniqueness and significance; inability to show empathy; ideas about one’s own freedom from any rules, that those around them envy them.

Narcissistic personalities constantly try to control the opinions of others about themselves. They tend to devalue almost everything around them in the world, while idealizing what they associate themselves with.
15. Paranoid

"Paranoid" is often used colloquially to simply mean "worried" or "shy": "I'm paranoid because I have something stuck in my teeth"; “I am paranoid when someone asks me to hold their child, what if I drop him”; "I'm always paranoid when crossing the border." This has little to do with the clinical version.

In the classical sense, the word "paranoia" was the original Greek general term for mental illness, derived from παρά "near, beside" and νόος "thought, mind", in other words, "out of one's mind".

Recently, it has become a more specific diagnosis. Paranoid personality disorder in the DSM-5 sense means "a pervasive distrust and suspicion of others so that their motives are interpreted as malicious." It doesn't mean worrying too much about things going badly. It means treating compliments as underhanded criticism, treating honest mistakes as malicious intent, and holding grudges for a long time.

Empathy and other psychology terms that we often confuse and use incorrectly

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