Psych Attack

In this episode, I catch up with Rahim Thawer about envy and its impacts in our social and sexual lives. Rahim is a racialized, queer social worker who works as an instructor, psychotherapist, clinical supervisor, consultant, public speaker, podcast host [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-cbt-dive/id1578761853], and writer [https://www.affectiveconsult.ca/writing]. He calls Toronto home and currently teaches at The University of Alabama [https://socialwork.ua.edu/blog/rahimthawer/]. His work [https://www.affectiveconsult.ca/] explores the intersection of mental health and systemic oppression. He has a particular interest in examining innovation in queer relationships and exploring how anti-racist, queer-affirming psychoanalytic frameworks can support social workers, training therapists, and organizational leaders. Episode content 0:00 - Introduction 1:16 - Rahim's background and focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) 6:21 - How Rahim got interested in envy 11:48 - The difference between envy and jealousy 17:09 - Queer experiences of envy 20:07 - Envy and systemic oppression 20:53 - How to manage envy 25:49 - Has social media made envy worse? 29:46 - Online content creators and envy 31:22 - Can envy be managed through CBT? 34:39 - Why are some people not impacted by envy? 40:19 - How to keep up to date with Rahim’s work   Works mentioned in this episode Thawer, R. (2022, June 9). The Matrix of Envy in Our Social and Sexual Lives. [https://medium.com/@rahimthawer/the-matrix-of-envy-in-our-social-and-sexual-lives-474d46f2a172] Medium. Thawer, R. (2025). The Mental Health Guide for Cis and Trans Queer Guys: Skills to Cope and Thrive as Your Authentic Self. Publisher: New Harbinger Publications. [Pre-Order [https://a.co/d/b7NBfJ4]] To see more of Rahim's work, check out ladyativan.com [https://allmylinks.com/ladyativan]   Cite this episode MacDonald, J. B. & Thawer, R. (2025, Jan 15). Envy in our social and sexual lives (No. 24) [Audio podcast episode]. In Psych Attack. www.psychattack.com [http://www.psychattack.com/]   Transcript The transcript for this episode was developed using transcription software. There may be some errors in the content as I do not have capacity to review for accuracy.   Acknowledgements Psych Attack is created and hosted by Dr Jasmine B. MacDonald [https://jasminebmacdonald.com.au/]. The video and audio for this episode was edited by Morgan McRae. Special thanks to Rahim Thawer for sharing your time and expertise.

To round out 2024, I have created this highlights episode. This year, the 6 guests (from Australia, Finland and the U.S.) and I have covered: * investigative interviewing for disclosures of maltreatment (Episode 17 [https://www.psychattack.com/episodes/developmental-insights-for-investigative-interviewing-about-maltreatment-with-associate-professor-lindsay-malloy]) * what sex therapy is, kink and paraphilias (Episode 18 [https://www.psychattack.com/episodes/sex-therapy-kink-and-paraphilias]) * academic mental health (Episode 19 [https://www.psychattack.com/episodes/academic-mental-health]) * self-advocacy and professional development and relationships (Episode 20 [https://www.psychattack.com/episodes/self-advocacy-and-professional-relationships]) * human-dog relationships (Episode 21 [https://www.psychattack.com/episodes/factors-that-affect-human-dog-relationships]) * adolescent mental health and the use of digital phenotyping (Episode 22 [https://www.psychattack.com/episodes/digital-phenotyping-using-smartphone-metadata-to-predict-mental-health-symptoms]). Cite this episode MacDonald, J. B. (2024, December 20). Psych Attack highlights 2024 (No. 23) [Audio podcast episode]. In Psych Attack. www.psychattack.com [https://www.psychattack.com/] Transcript The transcript for this episode was developed using transcription software. There may be some errors in the content as I do not have capacity to review for accuracy.

In this episode, I catch up with Dr Taylor A. Braund to hear about his research into digital phenotyping. In particular, we discuss the link between mental health symptoms and keystroke metadata from smartphones.   Dr Taylor A. Braund is a Research Fellow at Black Dog Institute [https://www.blackdoginstitute.org.au/researcher/taylor-braund/] and UNSW School of Clinical Medicine [https://www.unsw.edu.au/staff/taylor-braund], Australia. To see more of Taylor’s work, you can reach out on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/taylorbraund/] or Twitter [https://twitter.com/Taylor_Braund].   Research mentioned in this episode Braund, T.A. (2024). The continued hype and hope of digital phenotyping. [https://www.nature.com/articles/s44159-024-00326-9]Nature Reviews Psychology, 3(448).   Braund, T. A., O’Dea, B., Bal, D., Maston, K., Larsen, M., Werner-Seidler, A., Tillman, G., & Christensen, H. (2023). Associations between smartphone keystroke metadata and mental health symptoms in adolescents: Findings from the Future Proofing Study. [https://mental.jmir.org/2023/1/e44986] JMIR Mental Health, 10(e44986).    Braund, T. A., Zin, M. T., Boonstra, T. W., Wong, Q. J. J., Larsen, M. E., Christensen, H., Tillman, G., O’Dea, B. (2022). Smartphone sensor data for identifying and monitoring symptoms of mood disorders: A longitudinal observational study. [https://mental.jmir.org/2022/5/e35549/] JMIR Mental Health, 9(5):e35549    O’Dea, B., Braund, T. A., Batterham, P. J., Larsen, M. E., Glozier, N., & Whitton, A. E. (2024). Reading between the lines: Identifying the linguistic markers of Anhedonia for the stratification of depression. [https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3613904.3642478] CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. (Paper)   Seminal digital phenotyping papers Huckvale, K., Venkatesh, S., & Christensen, H. (2019). Toward clinical digital phenotyping: A timely opportunity to consider purpose, quality, and safety. [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41746-019-0166-1#citeas]npj Digital Medicine, 2(88).   Insel, T. R. (2017). Digital phenotyping: Technology for a new science of behavior. [https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2654782] JAMA, 318(13):1215–1216.    Torous, J., Kiang, M. V., Lorme, J., & Onnela, J. P. (2016). New tools for new research in psychiatry: A scalable and customizable platform to empower data driven smartphone research. [https://mental.jmir.org/2016/2/e16/]JMIR Mental Health, 3(2):e16.   Some available digital phenotyping platforms https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/onnela-lab/beiwe-research-platform/ [https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/onnela-lab/beiwe-research-platform/] https://www.digitalpsych.org/lamp.html [https://www.digitalpsych.org/lamp.html] https://www.biaffect.com/ [https://www.biaffect.com/]   Cite this episode MacDonald, J. B. & Braund, T. A. (2024, Oct 1). Digital phenotyping: Using smartphone metadata to predict mental health symptoms (No. 22) [Audio podcast episode]. In Psych Attack. www.psychattack.com [http://www.psychattack.com/]   Transcript The transcript for this episode was developed using transcription software. There may be some errors in the content as I do not have capacity to review for accuracy.   Acknowledgements Psych Attack is created and hosted by Dr Jasmine B. MacDonald [https://jasminebmacdonald.com.au/]. The video and audio for this episode was edited by Morgan McRae. Special thanks to Dr Taylor A. Braund for sharing your time and expertise. Please note that the views and opinions expressed by Taylor in this episode are his own and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policy of his employer.

In this episode, I catch up with Dr Miiamaaria Kujala to hear about her research on human-dog relationships. Miiamaaria studies how humans understand dog communication, how dogs understand humans, and the factors affecting the interaction between the two species such as culture, human personality and dog behaviour. We discuss: - Her personal journey from philosophy to neuroscience and eventually to studying both ends of the leash - The cultural differences in dog ownership between countries like Finland and Australia - The impact of human personality traits on dog behaviour and the human-dog relationship - How emotional closeness and perceived costs of dog ownership vary among different personalities - The methods used to measure dog cognition and behaviour, including the fascinating "impossible task" experiment.   Dr. Miiamaaria Kujala [https://www.jyu.fi/en/people/miiamaaria-kujala] is Academy Research Fellow in the Department of Psychology at University of Jyväskylä, Finland. To see more of Miiamaaria’s work you can access her research group’s web page [https://www.jyu.fi/fi/tutkimusryhmat/ihmisen-ja-koiran-vuorovaikutus].   Papers mentioned in this episode Bender, Y., Bräuer, J., & Schweinberger, S. R. (2023). What makes a good dog-owner team? – A systematic review about compatibility in personality and attachment [https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168159123000291]. Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 260. (Behind a pay wall)   Dwyer, F., Bennett, P. C., & Coleman, G. J. (2006). Development of the Monash Dog Owner Relationship Scale (MDORS). [https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.2752/089279306785415592] Anthrozoös, 19(3), 243-256. (Behind a pay wall)   Kujala, M. V., Imponen, N., Pirkkala, A., Silfverberg, T., Parviainen, T., Tiira, K., & Kiuru, N. (2023). Modulation of dog-owner relationship and dog social and cognitive behavior by owner temperament and dog breed group. [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10484941/] Scientific reports, 13(1), 14739. (Open access!)   Cite this episode MacDonald, J. B. & Kujala, M. V. (2024, September 2). Factors that affect human-dog relationships (No. 21) [Audio podcast episode]. In Psych Attack. www.psychattack.com [http://www.psychattack.com/]   Transcript The transcript for this episode was developed using transcription software. There may be some errors in the content as I do not have capacity to review for accuracy.   Acknowledgements Special thanks to Dr Miiamaaria Kujala for sharing your time and expertise. Psych Attack is created and hosted by Dr Jasmine B. MacDonald [https://jasminebmacdonald.com.au/]. The audio for this episode was edited by Morgan McRae.

In this episode, I catch up with Dr Jade McEwen to hear about her professional and personal experiences of self-care, the benefits of being unapologetically self-promoting, and working out how to be heard in order to get the support you need.   Dr Jade McEwen is Assistant Director of Research, NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission, Australia. To see more of Jade’s work, you can reach out on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-jade-mcewen-589b294a/] or send her an email [http://jademcewen@hotmail.com].   Resources mentioned in this episode Hough, A., & McEwen, J. (2024). Building quality and safeguarding into disability service provision. In: Bigby, C., Hough, A. (eds) Disability Practice. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-6143-6_14 [https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-981-99-6143-6_14#citeas]   The whole book that Jade’s chapter comes from is open access. Thank you to the authors (and their respective institutions) for making this happen!   Cite this episode MacDonald, J. B., & McEwen, J. (2024, Aug 1). Self-advocacy and professional relationships (No. 20) [Audio podcast episode]. In Psych Attack. www.psychattack.com [http://www.psychattack.com/]   Transcript The transcript for this episode was developed using transcription software. There may be some errors in the content as I do not have capacity to review for accuracy.   Acknowledgements Special thanks to Dr Jade McEwen for sharing your time and expertise. Psych Attack is created and hosted by Dr Jasmine B. MacDonald [https://jasminebmacdonald.com.au/]. The audio for this episode was edited by Morgan McRae.