Anyone else hate the name?

I really dislike the name of the test. "Sanity" is a legal term as well as one that's frequently misused in the common language. Asking on the home page, "How insane are you?" is just a loaded question as there is so much stigma and so many myths about "sane" and "insane".

Anyone else feel this way?

gg

It's misleading at best, IMO. At first I thought that the higher the score, the more "sane" I was.

Interested in any ideas you may have, though.

To be perfectly honest, at this point in time I could not possibly care less about stigma, I just want to feel better!. Don't worry about semantics, worry about you, you are MUCH more important....

Don't get wrapped up in semantics "gardenergirl"! If the results confirm what you already knew then just accept the evaluation (for what it's worth)!

I don't think it was meant to imply anything, it's just catchy

Well... Since there seems to be some serious research going into its development you would really think that they wouldn't want to cheapen it by giving it a popular name that seems to reduce it to about the level of the tests you find in your average self help book...

'Insane' is indeed a technical term - in law, as GG said. The test isn't measuring sanity / insanity in the legal sense and I'm jolly surprised that the makers didn't think of that and realize that it is indeed a pretty severe case of false advertising... You wouldn't want a person thinking that a high score would absolve them of a crime, would you now?

I find the name puzzling as well.

I also find the whole thing puzzling, though, to tell you the honest truth.

A test that basically validates peoples conscious or unconscious beliefs about their situation. What is the point, exactly? I simply don't understand... Self diagnostics... Wouldn't work so well for neurology, wouldn't work so well for oncology, wouldn't work so well for cognitive neuropsychology... I'm sure the doctors / clinical psychologists out there are just stoked about their patients coming along with their self diagnostics all complete.

That's interesting because I never even bothered to look into this test and what it was about or take it because of the title. I know I'm sane so I thought the test had no relevance to me. What does the test measure?

If you read All of the answers through, rather than just the numbers it will tell you that this test score is NOT a diagnosis. It just gives you some idea of what you should be seeking help for from a "Professional". This is really just a tool to help you gain some perspective on your situation. This is my understanding anyway.....

> It just gives you some idea of what you should be seeking help for from a "Professional".

But that is the issue... When the 'sanity score' tells you you should be seeking help for x and y and z and when the professionals say that isn't an issue. I'm sure the professionals really appreciate self-diagnostics...

That's a good question that validity studies could best answer.

Good points. I have some of the same concerns. It's one of the more thorough screeners I've seen on the internet, but there is a lot of interpretation of even the best tests that a computer just can't do. My MMPI says that I'm probably a psychotic drug addict with mood and personality disorders. I'm not psychotic and haven't ever used drugs. The compouter doesn't know that though. You have to look at information like this in context, and even when it says it isn't for diagnostic purposes, why else are most people going to take a test like this?

I also thought if it's a test of Sanity, a higher score ought to indicate healthier, and catchy titles definitely can be misleading.

Folks, it's a name. A name I picked -- hate it, love it, does it really matter? I had a number of criteria I had to meet to determine an appropriate name, so it wasn't done on a whim. "Insanity" is a term that has a long, long history and has only entered into legal nomenclature relatively recently. I don't put any positive or negative connotation on it.

As for its validity, it's a screening measure, which means it hopefully gives you some insight into possible issues in your life. No more, no less. It doesn't diagnose, nor does it intend to. But it can help -- and has helped thousands -- to walk down a road to figuring out whether they should consult a mental health professional for further help.

While I think it's also fun to try and second-guess the perfect nomenclature for public services like this, I'm not sure what the point ultimately is, other than an intellectual exercise in phrasing or labels. And as anyone who knows me, I put little faith into labels.

DocJohn

If I called you an idiot or a psycho then I think you would object - and rightly so. That just goes to illustrate that names DO matter. It matters whether we call people names or not, and it certainly matters what names we apply to ourself: Whether that be 'insane' 'mentally ill' 'borderline' etc etc etc. If I remember rightly a member here was blocked once for suggesting that a person might like to think about borderline personality... Diagnostics (by me) weren't thought to be appropriate... When diagnostic names are suggested by a 'sanity score' I fail to see how anybody willing to take a test with such a dubious label is terribly likely to appreciate that the diagnostic labels that the test is applying to them isn't an act of diagnosis. How bizarre!

The 'insanity defense' has been around for ages... Before the industrial revolution... It is fairly clearly a legal notion...

> As for its validity, it's a screening measure, which means it hopefully gives you some insight into possible issues in your life. No more, no less. It doesn't diagnose, nor does it intend to. But it can help -- and has helped thousands -- to walk down a road to figuring out whether they should consult a mental health professional for further help.

It seems that people take the test because they are worried that there is something wrong (otherwise why would you take it). The test then rattles off several things that they might want to be concerned about (on the basis of issues that they basically tell the test they find problematic). The test then tells them to seek professional help.

So: Go seek the advice of a health professional.

Did you really need a test to tell people who were worried about their mental health to go see a professional? What was to be gained by giving them particular names of conditions to research up on before going to the doc (e.g., borderline personality disorder). There still are many clinicians who don't feel that labels are helpful... DSM Labels in particular should not just be thrown around and certainly not on the basis of self report.

It is a way to train peoples distress into categories that are currently recognitised by the profession...

It is a way of undermining the scientific credibility of psychiatry / clinical psychology... It is a way of being seen to condone all those self help self diagnostic tests out there... It is... Bizzarre... That is what it is. I simply don't understand...

i personally dont think the name was meant to be taken seriously, also insinuating that the test isnt entirely 'serious'. as in, not for use for diagnosis.

but yeah.

im convinced that sanity is an illusion, albeit a very persistant one; just like reality.
(thankyou einstein)

Up until the late 19th, early 20th century, the term "insane" was both a completely useful and widely used medical term as well as legal term. It was the common term applied to people of "unsound mind:"

"Until well into the 19th century the word insanity was ubiquitous, not only in medical writing, but in that of the legal and lay world as well. It was the general term used by both professions and the public to refer, in the words of the 1851 Webster’s Dictionary, to the "state of being unsound in mind" and "applicable to any degree of mental derangement from slight delirium or wandering, to distraction." *

Screening measures are a valid tool to help people determine if they seek help. More than 1/3 of the people who take the Sanity Score receive scores that indicate no specific concern reaches a sufficient threshold to recommend talking to a professional, so indeed, it is helping people make such a determination.

Thanks for your feedback about the name and its intended purpose.

DocJohn

* - http://www.jaapl.org/cgi/content/full/33/2/252