(no subject)
Decided to type out this entire article which is in today's issue (Thursday, May 5 2011) of Mind Your Body.
The Price of Perfection
The need to be perfect can drive on to despair. LEA WEE (leawee@sph.com.sg) reports
In the recent movie Black Swan, Nina the ballerina wakes up at night to practise and starves herself - all because she wants to be the perfect dancer. But even as she strives for perfection, she worries constantly that she is not good enough. Nina, played by Natalie Portman, is experiencing what psychological research has recently begun to document: the fine line between a perfectionism that pushes people to their peak performance and one that tips them into the abyss of psychological distress
No one knows how many perfectionists there are. Unlike depression, perfectionism is not a formal diagnosis. But in the last decade or two, tools have emerged to measure the trait so psychologists can research it and devise help.
Perfectionists can turn maladaptive in the pursuit of their goals if they become mired in irrational fears about making mistakes and their ability to perform well, said Ms Chermain Wong, a clinical psychologist from the Institute of Mental Health. She said: "Maladaptive perfectionists have a phobia of making mistakes, no matter how small they are. They engage in all-or-nothing thinking in which anything that is less than perfect is a failure to them."
They can spend an unnecessary amount of time on small details just to get them right. However, they stll get the nagging feeling that their work is not good enough, even if it gets good reviews from others, said Dr Ryan Hong, an assistant professor from the department of psychology at National University of Singapore (NUS).
Exhausted by perfectionism
Ms Wong cited the example of a junior college student who was so overwhelmed by her need to be flawless that she would redo her assignments 10 to 15 times. This became so exhausting that she put off doing her assignments and her grades plunged. she became depressed and overdosed on medication but was found in time by her parents.
Indeed, maladaptive perfectionism is implicated in the "development and maintenance" of psychiatric disorders such as depression, anxiety and eating disorders, said Dr Hong, citing a recent review of literature on perfectionism in the Clinical Psychology Review.
A local survey of 283 Primary 5 pupils found that those who scored higher on a perfectionism scale were more anxious and depressed. The study by NUS psychology masters student Joanne Chua also found their feelings stemmed partly from a fear of being negatively viewed by others if they did not do well.
The tendency of maladaptive perfectionists to derive their self-worth from others seems to have its roots in their upbringing. In the case of the junior college student, she learnt from young that her parents would praise her only if she did better than her cousins in school, tennis and ballet. If she did worse, they would criticise or ignore her. Being perfect became her way of gaining their love and acceptance. Her parents, a lawyer and a doctor, were perfectionists too.
Research has shown that perfectionists often have parents who are overly critical and demanding. There is no easy way to help maladaptive perfectionists to snap out of their way of life. Studies show that perfectionism is a relatively enduring personality trait. Said Ms Wong: "Personality is shaped by innate temperament and early experiences. Hence, it is more enduring than, say, an illness like depression that may be triggered by external stressful event." Ultimately, the patient has to want to change. Said Ms Wong: "Through a process called 'motivational interviewing', we help patients see that their ways of achieving perfection are at the expense of more important things such as their physical and emotional health. This, in turn, impedes their ability to attain perfection."
Once they are motivated to change, a variety of strategies, including setting realistic goals, can be suggested. Using these strategies, the junior college student is slowly coming out of depression and learning to feel less of a failure when she makes mistakes. Said Ms Wong: "She is taking an interest in things other than her school work and slowly realising that there's a lot more to life than perfect grades."
Coping tips
If you think perfectionism is affecting your life and you want to change this, here are some tips from psychologist Chermain Wong from the Institute of Mental Health (IMH).
1. Get to know your perfectionism. Be more aware of your perfectionist ways of thinking and behaving and their effects on you and the people around you. Find out what triggers such thoughts and behaviour.
2. Challenge the belief that you need to be perfect in all you do. ask if it is worthwhile to spend a disproportionate amount of time and effort to fix a non-critical detail that others may not even notice. Evaluate your values and life goals. Do they fall in line with being a perfectionist?
3. Re-evaluate your all-or-nothing thinking. Acknowledge the good parts of a performance before you criticise the less than perfect parts.
4. Evaluate success not just on the result, but on the process. Ask yourself what you have learnt through the process. Was it enjoyable?
5. Learn to deal with criticism. Rather than see it as a personal attack, deal with it in a cool and impersonal manner. For instance, think about how you can use it to help you improve on a task?
6. Learn to accept yourself as you are. Celebrate your strengths. Praise and say kind words to yourself every day.
Are you a perfectionist?
Answer the following questions based on a scale of 1 to 5: 1 for strongly disagree, 2 for disagree, 3 for neither agree nor disagree, 4 for agree and 5 for strongly disagree.
1. If I do not set the highest standards for myself, I am likely to end up a second-rate person.
2. It is important to me that I be thoroughly competent in everything I do.
3. If I fail at work/school, I am a failure as a person.
4. I should be upset if I make a mistake.
5. I set higher goals for myself than most people.
6. If someone does a task at work or school better than I, then I feel like I failed at the whole task.
7. If I fail partly, it is as bad as being a complete failure.
8. I am very good at focusing my efforts on attaining a goal.
9. Even when I do something very carefully, I often feel that is not not done quite right.
10. I hate being less than the best at things.
11. I have extremely high goals.
12. People will probably think less of me if I make a mistake.
13. If I do not do as well as other people, it means I am an inferior human being.
14. Other people seem to accept lower standards from themselves than I do.
15. If I do not do well all the time, people will not respect me.
16. I usually have doubts about the simple everyday things I do.
17. I expect higher performance in my daily tasks than most people.
18. I tend to get behind in my work because I repeat things over and over.
19. It takes me a long time to do something "right".
20. The fewer mistakes I make, the more people will like me.
Add up your score and if it is higher than that of an average person's score of 40, it means that your perfectionism may be maladaptive. If your perfectionism is causing you a lot of emotional distress, you may want to seek professional help.
This questionnaire has been adapted with permission from its author, Dr Randy Frost, who teaches abnormal psychology at Smith College in the United States. It tabulates a person's scores on three out of a total of six subscales: concern over mistakes, doubts about actions and personal standards.
He said in an e-mail message that the scores on these three subscales are more important than the overall score. The two subscales of concern over mistakes and doubts about actions measure the most maladaptive aspects of perfectionism, while the personal standards of subscale measures adaptive perfectionism, which can be problematic in some contexts.
For a full version of the questionnaire, go to www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/mind/surveys/perfectionism.
Wee. L. (2011, May 5). The price of perfection. Mind Your Body, pp. 6-7.
The Price of Perfection
The need to be perfect can drive on to despair. LEA WEE (leawee@sph.com.sg) reports
In the recent movie Black Swan, Nina the ballerina wakes up at night to practise and starves herself - all because she wants to be the perfect dancer. But even as she strives for perfection, she worries constantly that she is not good enough. Nina, played by Natalie Portman, is experiencing what psychological research has recently begun to document: the fine line between a perfectionism that pushes people to their peak performance and one that tips them into the abyss of psychological distress
No one knows how many perfectionists there are. Unlike depression, perfectionism is not a formal diagnosis. But in the last decade or two, tools have emerged to measure the trait so psychologists can research it and devise help.
Perfectionists can turn maladaptive in the pursuit of their goals if they become mired in irrational fears about making mistakes and their ability to perform well, said Ms Chermain Wong, a clinical psychologist from the Institute of Mental Health. She said: "Maladaptive perfectionists have a phobia of making mistakes, no matter how small they are. They engage in all-or-nothing thinking in which anything that is less than perfect is a failure to them."
They can spend an unnecessary amount of time on small details just to get them right. However, they stll get the nagging feeling that their work is not good enough, even if it gets good reviews from others, said Dr Ryan Hong, an assistant professor from the department of psychology at National University of Singapore (NUS).
Exhausted by perfectionism
Ms Wong cited the example of a junior college student who was so overwhelmed by her need to be flawless that she would redo her assignments 10 to 15 times. This became so exhausting that she put off doing her assignments and her grades plunged. she became depressed and overdosed on medication but was found in time by her parents.
Indeed, maladaptive perfectionism is implicated in the "development and maintenance" of psychiatric disorders such as depression, anxiety and eating disorders, said Dr Hong, citing a recent review of literature on perfectionism in the Clinical Psychology Review.
A local survey of 283 Primary 5 pupils found that those who scored higher on a perfectionism scale were more anxious and depressed. The study by NUS psychology masters student Joanne Chua also found their feelings stemmed partly from a fear of being negatively viewed by others if they did not do well.
The tendency of maladaptive perfectionists to derive their self-worth from others seems to have its roots in their upbringing. In the case of the junior college student, she learnt from young that her parents would praise her only if she did better than her cousins in school, tennis and ballet. If she did worse, they would criticise or ignore her. Being perfect became her way of gaining their love and acceptance. Her parents, a lawyer and a doctor, were perfectionists too.
Research has shown that perfectionists often have parents who are overly critical and demanding. There is no easy way to help maladaptive perfectionists to snap out of their way of life. Studies show that perfectionism is a relatively enduring personality trait. Said Ms Wong: "Personality is shaped by innate temperament and early experiences. Hence, it is more enduring than, say, an illness like depression that may be triggered by external stressful event." Ultimately, the patient has to want to change. Said Ms Wong: "Through a process called 'motivational interviewing', we help patients see that their ways of achieving perfection are at the expense of more important things such as their physical and emotional health. This, in turn, impedes their ability to attain perfection."
Once they are motivated to change, a variety of strategies, including setting realistic goals, can be suggested. Using these strategies, the junior college student is slowly coming out of depression and learning to feel less of a failure when she makes mistakes. Said Ms Wong: "She is taking an interest in things other than her school work and slowly realising that there's a lot more to life than perfect grades."
Coping tips
If you think perfectionism is affecting your life and you want to change this, here are some tips from psychologist Chermain Wong from the Institute of Mental Health (IMH).
1. Get to know your perfectionism. Be more aware of your perfectionist ways of thinking and behaving and their effects on you and the people around you. Find out what triggers such thoughts and behaviour.
2. Challenge the belief that you need to be perfect in all you do. ask if it is worthwhile to spend a disproportionate amount of time and effort to fix a non-critical detail that others may not even notice. Evaluate your values and life goals. Do they fall in line with being a perfectionist?
3. Re-evaluate your all-or-nothing thinking. Acknowledge the good parts of a performance before you criticise the less than perfect parts.
4. Evaluate success not just on the result, but on the process. Ask yourself what you have learnt through the process. Was it enjoyable?
5. Learn to deal with criticism. Rather than see it as a personal attack, deal with it in a cool and impersonal manner. For instance, think about how you can use it to help you improve on a task?
6. Learn to accept yourself as you are. Celebrate your strengths. Praise and say kind words to yourself every day.
Are you a perfectionist?
Answer the following questions based on a scale of 1 to 5: 1 for strongly disagree, 2 for disagree, 3 for neither agree nor disagree, 4 for agree and 5 for strongly disagree.
1. If I do not set the highest standards for myself, I am likely to end up a second-rate person.
2. It is important to me that I be thoroughly competent in everything I do.
3. If I fail at work/school, I am a failure as a person.
4. I should be upset if I make a mistake.
5. I set higher goals for myself than most people.
6. If someone does a task at work or school better than I, then I feel like I failed at the whole task.
7. If I fail partly, it is as bad as being a complete failure.
8. I am very good at focusing my efforts on attaining a goal.
9. Even when I do something very carefully, I often feel that is not not done quite right.
10. I hate being less than the best at things.
11. I have extremely high goals.
12. People will probably think less of me if I make a mistake.
13. If I do not do as well as other people, it means I am an inferior human being.
14. Other people seem to accept lower standards from themselves than I do.
15. If I do not do well all the time, people will not respect me.
16. I usually have doubts about the simple everyday things I do.
17. I expect higher performance in my daily tasks than most people.
18. I tend to get behind in my work because I repeat things over and over.
19. It takes me a long time to do something "right".
20. The fewer mistakes I make, the more people will like me.
Add up your score and if it is higher than that of an average person's score of 40, it means that your perfectionism may be maladaptive. If your perfectionism is causing you a lot of emotional distress, you may want to seek professional help.
This questionnaire has been adapted with permission from its author, Dr Randy Frost, who teaches abnormal psychology at Smith College in the United States. It tabulates a person's scores on three out of a total of six subscales: concern over mistakes, doubts about actions and personal standards.
He said in an e-mail message that the scores on these three subscales are more important than the overall score. The two subscales of concern over mistakes and doubts about actions measure the most maladaptive aspects of perfectionism, while the personal standards of subscale measures adaptive perfectionism, which can be problematic in some contexts.
For a full version of the questionnaire, go to www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/mind/surveys/perfectionism.
Wee. L. (2011, May 5). The price of perfection. Mind Your Body, pp. 6-7.