In the complex world of mental health, the path to genuine wellbeing is often obscured by a haze of misinformation and dubious claims. As people navigate this labyrinth, they find themselves vulnerable to the allure of pseudoscience – a landscape where false promises can lead them astray from evidence-based care and into harm’s way.
Enter Dr. Jonathan Stea, a clinical psychologist and adjunct assistant professor at the University of Calgary, who has made it his mission to illuminate this shadowy terrain. In his groundbreaking book, Mind the Science: Saving Your Mental Health from the Wellness Industry, Dr. Stea equips readers with the tools to distinguish science from pseudoscience, empowering them to make informed choices about their mental health.
The following is an interview in full with Dr. Stea, who shares his motivations behind his work, the dangers of pseudoscientific practices, and the practical wisdom he offers for those seeking reliable guidance on legitimate, effective mental health support…
Q: Your book explores pseudoscience in mental health care. For readers who might be new to this term, could you explain what we mean by ‘pseudoscience’ and why it matters specifically in mental health?
When speaking about pseudoscience, it’s important to define what it means. The question of how to draw the line between science and pseudoscience is known in the history and philosophy of science as the demarcation problem. It’s important to understand that there’s no single criterion that draws the line between science and pseudoscience – rather, identifying pseudoscience becomes a matter of probability: the more warning signs we see, the greater likelihood that we’re looking at pseudoscience. Some warning signs include: an over-reliance on anecdotal evidence; claims divorced from the broader scientific literature; reversing the burden of proof; scientific-sounding but nonsensical language; a focus on confirmation rather than refutation; explaining away negative findings; evasion of peer review; absence of self-correction; and applying claims to an endless list of health conditions.
Understanding how to identify and avoid pseudoscience are paramount to making informed decisions about one’s mental health. There’s an estimated 600 brands of psychotherapy circulating in the world of mental health and that number is growing. Many haven’t been tested so we don’t know if they work; and many are pseudoscientific and could be harmful. More broadly, many pseudoscientific treatments are also unethically promoted in the wellness industry by people without any expertise or credentials, using legally-non-protected titles (depending on particular countries and jurisdictions), such as “therapists,” “counsellors,” and “wellness coaches.”
Q: The wellness industry is a growing market worth billions of dollars and operates with minimal regulation. What motivated you to write this book now, and what do you see as the most pressing dangers facing consumers?
I embarked on this mission because I’ve seen so many people hurt by pseudoscience. I wrote this book to empower people to take their mental health into their own hands and to protect themselves against the onslaught of bogus mental health treatments and products that have increasingly flooded social media, popular media, and the business of healthcare itself. I wanted to create a resource that could be understood and used by everyone and wanted to teach the language of pseudoscientific grift so that people know when it’s spoken. This is a kind of mental health support I’m unable to provide in the role of clinician.
Psychologists also have an ethical duty and responsibility to society to promote and practice evidence-based patient care. This ethical duty is the inspiration for my science advocacy work, and it necessarily involves shining a light on the harms of the wellness industry.
The most pressing dangers facing the public come from a few non-mutually exclusive sources. The anti-vaccine movement and the modern anti-psychiatry movement are pseudoscientific assaults on public health. Additionally, the wellness and alternative medicine industries financially exploit people’s health and emotional vulnerabilities by commodifying pseudoscientific treatments. The result is that we see absurd claims such as denying the existence of germs and mental illness, but promoting the existence of human energy fields, homeopathic water memory, and telekinetic spoon bending. We see dangerous claims that vaccines cause autism and psychiatric medications are more harmful than helpful, and that the solution is to follow a fad diet or buy unsupported supplements to address a faux “root cause.”
Q: Many people struggle to distinguish between legitimate wellness practices and questionable ones. In your book, you talk about susceptibility to false claims having nothing to do with intelligence. Could you explain why smart, educated people might fall for misleading mental health treatments?
The reality is that people fall for misinformation and pseudoscience due to the interaction of a variety of factors at individual, social, and systemic levels. At the individual level, science literacy, critical thinking, and intelligence are definitely important with respect to not succumbing to misinformation, but they’re only part of the puzzle. Even highly intelligent people can fail to think critically about information, especially when they aren’t motivated to do so and believe they’re right. In fact, some research even shows that intelligent people may have a somewhat larger bias blind spot than others, meaning that the smartest people may be less aware of their own biases.
At this individual level, many other variables come together and interact that place people at risk, such as their tendency toward conspiracy mentality, how high they score on a particular personality trait known as openness to experience, their tendency to believe pseudo-profound bullshit statements (Editor note: yep, it’s an actual thing), their reliance on an intuitive thinking style, their lack of intellectual humility, and their mistrust of institutions and health care providers. At the social and systemic levels, we are at the mercy of even more factors that influence our thinking and the kind of information that we see, such as social media algorithms that favor emotion-laden and oversimplified posts, and bad actors and organizations that explicitly target us with misinformation in the service of their own interests.
Q: In the book, you discuss how online wellness communities can create powerful parasocial relationships that make us susceptible to misinformation. Could you explain what these relationships look like and why they’re particularly effective at spreading pseudoscientific claims?
Parasocial relationships can develop quickly in online wellness communities. They involve a sense of closeness to people you don’t actually know; just like feeling connected to the characters in your favorite television show. As a result, these online spaces can feel very inclusive, welcoming, validating, and intimate. When members of these online communities share personal stories of their mental health journeys and feel bonded to one another, it can become easier to trust the information that is circulated, and as a result, it can become fertile ground for sharing misinformation and pseudoscience marketing.
Q: You share some harrowing examples of lived experiences where people’s lives have been devastated by pseudoscientific treatments. How would you advise having a conversation with someone who looks to such treatments? How do you walk the line between respecting autonomy and protecting people against potentially harmful treatments?
In clinical practice, mental health professionals must be willing to navigate misinformation in a way that adheres to evidence-based practice, respects patient autonomy, ensures safety, and empathically preserves therapeutic relationships. This delicate dance is not easy, but it’s necessary, and good clinicians have been trained to do so.
It can feel frustrating when misinformation shows up in personal relationships. When navigating misinformation outside of clinical practice with those who you care about, how you engage will depend on your intention – is your goal to change minds or preserve relationships? How you engage will also depend on the unique interpersonal dynamics – or way of interacting – that you have with that person. It can sometimes be helpful to give credible, evidence-based information on the topic, and it’s important to communicate in ways that express empathy, concern, and care.
Q: You take a balanced look at practices like meditation – acknowledging the benefits while warning against exaggerated claims. How can people tell when a mental health treatment or practice is being oversold?
To strengthen our grift detectors, we need to learn the warning signs of pseudoscience that I alluded to in the first interview question, and we need to become well-acquainted with alternative medicine propaganda tactics and tropes. In my book, Mind the Science, I provide lists of these warning signs, tactics, and tropes, and I explain them in depth. I strongly encourage people to get to know them and to even memorize them if they can. The more warning signs, tactics, and tropes that people see and hear with respect to a particular mental health treatment or practice, the more likely it becomes that hype is being promoted, not evidence or accuracy.
Q: You also talk about the importance of respecting cultural practices and beliefs, while holding all health treatments to account regardless of their origin. How do you approach this in terms of addressing deeply held beliefs about certain health treatments that might not be as effective as believed?
It’s the task of evidence-based mental health professionals to respect, study, incorporate, and practice in culturally competent ways, which involves being sensitive to how their personal values and biases may impact their therapeutic relationship with patients, striving for knowledge about the culture and worldview of their patients, and skillfully working with patients in a manner that’s culturally relevant. It’s important to know that the wellness industry and alternative medicine do no such thing. They sell distrust in modern medicine and frame their own practices as “exotic” or “ancient,” but many of the most popular ones were developed relatively recently. They’ll tell us that some of their wellness practices emerged from “a different way of knowing,” but then they’ll advertise those practices using a scientific lens with claims that “it works” minus the evidential backing. Some authors have argued that practices such as Ayurveda and yoga have been culturally misappropriated and misused for profit, reflecting a phenomenon called Orientalism, which means cherry-picking, stereotyping, and romanticizing aspects of the Eastern world.
People sometimes wonder how I respond to patients when they ask me about alternative medicine treatments. I explain that my approach to science communication is quite different from clinical work. Clinically, the therapeutic relationship matters the most. If a patient requests that I deliver an unequivocal pseudoscientific treatment, I will empathically decline, explaining that I cannot ethically practice a potentially harmful pseudoscientific treatment that is beyond my scope of practice. I will validate their thoughts and beliefs, and we will explore them together. I will also respect their autonomy to seek that type of treatment elsewhere while continuing to offer the best therapy based on the best evidence to the best of my ability.
Q; For someone who’s struggling with mental health challenges and feeling overwhelmed by all the information out there, what are some practical tips from your book for finding reliable help and guidance?
When searching for quality mental health information online, it’s just as crucial to recognize what to avoid as it is to know what to seek. The very first step is to decide what kind of material you’re looking for, which could include ways to improve mental health on your own, or general information about the nature and treatment of mental disorders, or the assistance of local mental health professionals. In latter case, it can be helpful to have some questions in your back pocket and ready to go for an initial call with a potential practitioner or even your first couple of appointments.
It’s important to ask about a variety of topics such as their credentials; the kinds of mental health concerns they specialize in treating; the kinds of mental health concerns that are beyond their scope of practice; their clinical experience; the length of time they’ve been licensed and practicing; their familiarity with evidence-based treatments and the science behind them; and practical items such as the number of sessions, fees, and attendance policy. I empathize with the frustration of having to put in the work to find effective care when one is feeling at their lowest and most vulnerable. And at the same time, the world of mental health care is very much caveat emptor: buyer beware. And your mental health is on the line.
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To find out more about Dr. Stea’s work, visit his website.
You can also connect with Dr. Stea on X (formerly, Twitter) and Bluesky.
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