A nice idea that we at Living Fossils of course support - thank you for putting together this article. A few thoughts/critiques:
Randy Nesse has argued that something like MRT should NOT become yet-another psychotherapeutic technique. That would devalue the role of the evolutionary perspective, which really ought to be foundational to every technique. You somewhat argue for that in here, but I think your sentiment will be undermined by minting MRT. If it gains traction, won't it become just another modality for people to click on Psychology Today?
Another potential issue is that if MRT encourages people to connect with others, spend time outside, go for walks, eat right, and sleep better, a reasonable response will be: yeah, I already knew all that. One solution to this would be to create more complex case examples that arrive at more nuanced insights. Can something like MRT suggest novel interventions, ones your grandmother wouldn't tell you?
I agree that much of the value of MRT is undermined by the fact that people just can't fit it all in. How is someone who works in an office for 10 hours a day realistically supposed to eat right, move, and be in nature? At a certain point it's just a math problem.
A final critique is that the value of therapy often occurs at the level of process, not content. In fact, I think the evolutionary perspective can explain why most techniques perform about the same: it's not about their different contents, but more about the shared process of human connection. A social animal benefits from forming a meaningful social relationship - that's it. So, my worry would be that therapists who are focused too much on mismatch would forego the opportunity to connect with their clients, which is the main reason therapy works in the first place, at least IMO.
Again, thanks for writing and keep going with the idea.
On 'interventions your grandmother wouldn't tell you' - it's just those things that people seem to be missing! Turn off the computer, go outside, make friends, eat better, get some sleep...
These things seem obvious to people who are happy and healthy, but they're not always so obvious to people who present to therapy. And the devil is in the details. *Why* can't I get to sleep? What does it mean to 'eat better'? I assume the 1-1 conversational element of MRT would focus on these kinds of problems.
In all seriousness, it is interesting to ask whether the framework provided by MRT can be more easily applied than the grandma one. Is it easier to answer what your grandma would have done or what a hunter-gatherer would have done?
I think some framing like this is an important component because it will help people apply it to novel scenarios. We want to be teaching how to fish not giving fish. People know to eat well, sleep, exercise, and be among others, but knowing WHY is an important addition because it can inform less obvious stuff, like why texting might not "hit" as hard as in-person interaction, or why waking with the sun will be less abrupt than waking to an alarm clock.
I also take your point that although many people know that they should do these things, they might not know HOW. No arguments there. However, if we positioned therapists as the professionals who taught people these devils in the details, their training would be radically different. Their courses might look like "Diet," "Sleep," "Exercise," "Sociality," and so on, rather than "Lifespan Development," "DSM Assessment," or "Multicultural Counseling."
I would be a HUGE fan of this shift, fwiw, although if I were given the keys to entirely revamp the curriculum for practitioners, I'm not sure this would be my final answer. But it would certainly be something in this direction. I'll continue to mull.
I find it alarming that a mental health professional is citing Peter Attia (known Epstein associate and proud misogynist) and Andrew Huberman (known abuser of women and oft-debunked pseudo-scientist) in the first sentence of a piece on emotional health. What these two have in common is that they find girls and women to be less than human and deserving of abuse and exploitation. They have nothing to add to the discourse around human well-being.
Shucks, we are so untethered from our evolutionary expectations that every human being can easily becoming a moral monster: just isolate them with too much power. People who commit heinous crimes need to be held accountable, and hopefully cured, their prefrontal lobes reinvigorated. For a severe case, perhaps a cure would start with holding a kitten for six hours a day. After a year they might get a puppy.
Ideas are useful or not independent of origin. For shall we also disregard everything JFK, MLK, or Noam ever said?
Beg you pardon, I forgot to start with: I agree that we cannot casually reference moral monsters as if they deserve respect. Bill Cosby, rapist, is not even funny anymore.
This is great! I think this would work very well in a group setting, perhaps supplemented with 1-1 sessions to help participants address individual barriers to progress.
There are interesting commonalities with Compassion Focused Therapy, of which there's also a group therapy. The psychoeducation part and intention are similar, but without the meditation and compassion focuses.
Thank you for a very nice introduction to evolutionary mismatch reduction therapy. How nice to see the commonality of some of my favorite thinkers. There is a reason that these thinkers resonate with me and you put your pencil on it.
A nice idea that we at Living Fossils of course support - thank you for putting together this article. A few thoughts/critiques:
Randy Nesse has argued that something like MRT should NOT become yet-another psychotherapeutic technique. That would devalue the role of the evolutionary perspective, which really ought to be foundational to every technique. You somewhat argue for that in here, but I think your sentiment will be undermined by minting MRT. If it gains traction, won't it become just another modality for people to click on Psychology Today?
Another potential issue is that if MRT encourages people to connect with others, spend time outside, go for walks, eat right, and sleep better, a reasonable response will be: yeah, I already knew all that. One solution to this would be to create more complex case examples that arrive at more nuanced insights. Can something like MRT suggest novel interventions, ones your grandmother wouldn't tell you?
I agree that much of the value of MRT is undermined by the fact that people just can't fit it all in. How is someone who works in an office for 10 hours a day realistically supposed to eat right, move, and be in nature? At a certain point it's just a math problem.
A final critique is that the value of therapy often occurs at the level of process, not content. In fact, I think the evolutionary perspective can explain why most techniques perform about the same: it's not about their different contents, but more about the shared process of human connection. A social animal benefits from forming a meaningful social relationship - that's it. So, my worry would be that therapists who are focused too much on mismatch would forego the opportunity to connect with their clients, which is the main reason therapy works in the first place, at least IMO.
Again, thanks for writing and keep going with the idea.
On 'interventions your grandmother wouldn't tell you' - it's just those things that people seem to be missing! Turn off the computer, go outside, make friends, eat better, get some sleep...
These things seem obvious to people who are happy and healthy, but they're not always so obvious to people who present to therapy. And the devil is in the details. *Why* can't I get to sleep? What does it mean to 'eat better'? I assume the 1-1 conversational element of MRT would focus on these kinds of problems.
Then let's just call it Grandma Therapy :)
Works for me!
In all seriousness, it is interesting to ask whether the framework provided by MRT can be more easily applied than the grandma one. Is it easier to answer what your grandma would have done or what a hunter-gatherer would have done?
I think some framing like this is an important component because it will help people apply it to novel scenarios. We want to be teaching how to fish not giving fish. People know to eat well, sleep, exercise, and be among others, but knowing WHY is an important addition because it can inform less obvious stuff, like why texting might not "hit" as hard as in-person interaction, or why waking with the sun will be less abrupt than waking to an alarm clock.
I also take your point that although many people know that they should do these things, they might not know HOW. No arguments there. However, if we positioned therapists as the professionals who taught people these devils in the details, their training would be radically different. Their courses might look like "Diet," "Sleep," "Exercise," "Sociality," and so on, rather than "Lifespan Development," "DSM Assessment," or "Multicultural Counseling."
I would be a HUGE fan of this shift, fwiw, although if I were given the keys to entirely revamp the curriculum for practitioners, I'm not sure this would be my final answer. But it would certainly be something in this direction. I'll continue to mull.
I find it alarming that a mental health professional is citing Peter Attia (known Epstein associate and proud misogynist) and Andrew Huberman (known abuser of women and oft-debunked pseudo-scientist) in the first sentence of a piece on emotional health. What these two have in common is that they find girls and women to be less than human and deserving of abuse and exploitation. They have nothing to add to the discourse around human well-being.
Shucks, we are so untethered from our evolutionary expectations that every human being can easily becoming a moral monster: just isolate them with too much power. People who commit heinous crimes need to be held accountable, and hopefully cured, their prefrontal lobes reinvigorated. For a severe case, perhaps a cure would start with holding a kitten for six hours a day. After a year they might get a puppy.
Ideas are useful or not independent of origin. For shall we also disregard everything JFK, MLK, or Noam ever said?
Beg you pardon, I forgot to start with: I agree that we cannot casually reference moral monsters as if they deserve respect. Bill Cosby, rapist, is not even funny anymore.
I think it's better to compare MRT to a therapy that has integrated Evo psych more, like Compassion Focused Therapy.
This is great! I think this would work very well in a group setting, perhaps supplemented with 1-1 sessions to help participants address individual barriers to progress.
There are interesting commonalities with Compassion Focused Therapy, of which there's also a group therapy. The psychoeducation part and intention are similar, but without the meditation and compassion focuses.
Perhaps it would be more beneficial if your idea of MRT departed from there, as it is already stablished
Thank you for a very nice introduction to evolutionary mismatch reduction therapy. How nice to see the commonality of some of my favorite thinkers. There is a reason that these thinkers resonate with me and you put your pencil on it.
I take a look at the political consequences of evolutionary mismatch in A Measure of Democracy: https://meyerja.substack.com/p/a-measure-of-democracy
I’m happy to think that MRT will help heal our diseased democracy.