The stigma of being a shrink

Shrink, the abbreviation, became popular in the United States in the 1970s, though it had first appeared in one of Thomas Pynchon’s books, "The Crying of Lot 49," in 1965, and there is anecdotal evidence that it was around earlier, which is only to be expected of a slang term that would have been mainly transmitted through the spoken word in its earliest days.

The issue of stigma in mental health has gotten a lot of attention as being one reason that people who have difficulties may not seek help. Certainly, words can be powerful, but I wonder if the term "shrink" might actually be easier for patients to use? "I’m going to see my shrink," might imply a visit with any number of mental health professionals and might disassociate it from the implication that the patient is going to see a psychiatrist for treatment of a mental illness, a condition that the media is all too happy to tell us causes people to commit mass murders.

"Shrink" may have a disparaging tone to it, or it may have a ring of affection, depending on the context. Certainly, there are many negative associations and jokes related to being an attorney, and one friend told me that his son was "going to the dark side" when the son applied to law school. Still, there is no stigma associated with having an appointment with one’s lawyer, leading me to believe that a profession can be stigmatized without stigmatizing the clientele.

Some words have taken on a pervasively negative meaning; others are harder to capture. After 8 years, Shrink Rap is now a platform for our writing, invested with its own meanings to us and our readers. The psychiatrist who wrote in to say it is offensive, odd, and stigmatizing certainly has a different set of associations to the word then we do, or we would never have let this be a title for our work.

Dr. Miller is a coauthor of "Shrink Rap: Three Psychiatrists Explain Their Work" (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2011).