INTERPERSONAL links: Holistic Bliss or Tristram Shandy ... III
The INTERPERSONAL domain links are to my mind (no pun intended) fairly obvious, at least that first row complements the SCIENCES top row opposite.
Basically, who needs a talking therapy and who needs a drug therapy?
The two uppermost care domains are intended to represent the INDIVIDUAL axis, so just as the SCIENCES [ANATOMY & PHYS] domain covers physical care; so the INTERPERSONAL domain encompasses emotional and mental health care.
Hodges' model is comprised of four care domains, but it is these two [INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES] applied to the individual that even today we struggle to balance in theory and practice.
A key factor in Brian Hodges' early nursing career (and mine) has been the role of institutions, organisations and the formal policies and structures they represent. This can be depicted as:
EMOTIONAL HEALTH : PHYSICAL HEALTH (both 'individual')
OTHERS family, society : INSTITUTIONS (both 'group')
As to the INTERPERSONAL links themselves - I arrived at mental health through reading a psychology text on Wundt and introspection, then James..... PSYCHOLOGY being of central importance in this domain has two listings, with MENTAL HEALTH and closely related THERAPIES also sharing the top row. I may swap these around: PSYCH-OLOGY as a cognitive science should be placed rightmost, while MENTAL HEALTH and THERAPIES should be further to the left being more 'humanistic'. What do you think?
Do the sciences have to be corralled in the SCIENCES domain? I think I remember Bryan Magee and John Searle in conversation noting that many disciplines with science in their title are probably not sciences - in that upper right hand quadrant sense. Maybe it is just that -
cognitive science : "SCIENCE
social science : political science
- are still running wild out there, untamed and as yet unbroken? Cognitive science has however, clearly come of age and the 21st century will undoubtedly be the century of the brain when anatomy, physiology and genetics are linked to thought and individual (and even social) behaviour.
Already the content here highlights cognition (thought). The inclusion of other link categories in this upper-left set can be explained with recourse to cogitation. After PSYCHOLOGY, PHILOSOPHY (with ETHICS) is the rather obvious 'ology'.
For better or for worse our culture is driven more by IDEAS and ideology than philosophy. Call it the informal philosophical engine that drives CREATIVITY.
COMMUNICATION lies at the heart of all things human-e. Given the millennia that the patient-physician relationship has been around, you might expect it to be perfected by now. Well health and social care workers and the public they serve are still trying to reach empathic nirvana (although that may be to take communication a bit too far).
Hodges' model has a role to play supporting reflection for all.
IDEAS, COMMUNICATION lead us to belief and a central component in psychological therapies. Belief is also a thread can be used by one individual to lead others positively or to subvert other individual's capacity to think critically. It is in this INTERPERSONAL domain that good and evil are so proximal they create heat, fanned by a culturally driven winds of history and media from the South. Be-life indeed. Here then - THEOLOGY is purposefully placed with TRANSDISCIPLINARITY. If it is to serve humanity Religion must be bound and integrated into the corpus of knowledge and that includes reconciliation with the SCIENCES. We cannot deny myth and yet myth cannot deny evidence - a debate that will go on......
The economic emphasis placed
I have a little mantra that I share with students. It's not perfect as there is much overlap; but I figure that what
HEALTH PROTECTION and PROMOTION, SELF CARE are all about attitude. Of course, money in the form of departmental budgets (those institutions do matter) and family income can make a huge difference, but if the right attitudes are not present then you may as well - "go fish!".
In light of the above STUDY SKILLS and EDUCATION and TRAINING speak for themselves - on this occasion at least. One of the original purposes of Hodges' model was to facilitate reflective practice
If the SOCIAL domain reflects the worlds of the others, then the last INTERPERSONAL row REST & RECREATION reflects something of me and my family.
"Next!" - the SOCIOLOGY domain links....