Last August I posted about how anger may have become its own disorder instead of as a symptom of another disorder.
It looks like “intermittent explosive disorder” has resurfaced in the headlines. A few days ago I heard on the radio an “expert” who talked about how intermittent explosive disorder has caused the road rage phenomenon we have become familiar with today. I live in California and I can think of many reasons why I’d feel some road rage – often self-induced because I didn’t give myself enough time and when I’m in a rush to get somewhere, I’m more likely to drive aggressively and be less forgiving of other drivers’ mistakes.
Here’s a slew of headlines from Google News about how intermittent explosive disorder could be behind many road rage incidences. The collection of links also included Ben Grabow’s take on the road rage phenomenon and how we may be too quick to label road rage as an anger disorder rather than looking at other “non-organic” causes behind road rage.
I want to take this seriously, because we’ve had incidences of people getting shot on the road, attributed to “road rage” or random acts of violence. Still, I think we’re continuing to splinter symptoms into its own disorders so we can take medications to treat the symptoms instead of really understanding the root causes. We don’t even have depression and bipolar disorder down pat where diagnoses and treatments are concerned.
