The Thinking Mind: Mental Health & Personal Growth

How did amphetamines help shape the dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia?

In this clip from From E185 of The Thinking Mind Podcast, Dr Alex speaks with Professor Justin Garson about the experiments that helped transform psychiatry’s understanding of psychosis and schizophrenia.

They discuss how amphetamine-induced psychosis led researchers to focus on dopamine, how Solomon Snyder’s work helped establish the dopami...

This is a shorter Thinking Mind update on a developing story - our usual long-form episodes will continue as normal.

Dr Alex discusses reports that a forthcoming government review could significantly change how ADHD is assessed and supported in England. He explains the proposed shift toward a more "needs-based system", why it is being considered, and the potential implications for people seeking diagnosis and treatment.

Dr Alex also ...

Why does watching the 70 Up documentary feel like years of therapy? Watching lives unfold over six decades can make you reconsider your own: what you’re chasing, what you’re postponing and what really matters.

In this episode Dr. Alex explores ITV’s 70 Up from his perspective as a psychiatrist and therapist. Through the participants’ ambitions, relationships, disappointments and everyday joys, we examine four...

The Lindsay Clancy case has prompted an enormous debate about postpartum psychosis, criminal responsibility, psychiatric treatment and whether severe mental illness can ever be reliably predicted.

In this episode Dr. Alex examines the case not to deliver a verdict on Lindsay Clancy, but to explore what it reveals about the realities and limitations of psychiatry.

The episode looks at Lindsay Clancy’s psychiatric deterioration a...

How do you arrive at your beliefs?

In this clip from E182 of the podcast, Dr Alex speaks with consultant neuropsychiatrist Dr Tom Pollack about what AI-associated delusions may reveal about human belief itself. Rather than treating belief as something purely rational (a simple matter of evidence, logic or facts) they explore how beliefs are also shaped by emotion, meaning, charisma, relationships and narrative. They also discuss how...

In this update to last week’s episode,  Dr Alex reflects on the response to Channel 4’s The Great ADHD Myth? and on an important new development. He also discusses what that means for the documentary, the wider ADHD debate, and the importance of discussing complex mental health issues without stigma, contempt or oversimplification.

Presented by Dr. Alex Curmi. Dr. Alex is a consultant psychiatrist and a UKCP...

In this episode of The Thinking Mind Podcast, Dr. Alex responds to Channel 4’s new documentary The Great ADHD Myth?

Presented by psychiatrist Dr Max Pemberton, this film asks whether ADHD is really a neurodevelopmental disorder, and whether ADHD diagnosis and medication have gone too far.
 
He discusses this documentary and examines where it raises important questions, and where its conclusions go beyond th...

What if one of psychiatry’s most influential ideas began with LSD, amphetamines and a handful of experiments that would be difficult to imagine today?

In this episode, Dr. Alex speaks with philosophy Professor Justin Garson about his new book, The Madness Pill: One Doctor’s Quest to Understand Schizophrenia. They explore the remarkable story of neuroscientist Solomon Snyder, whose work helped establish the dopamine hypot...

Is being a tradwife really just about baking bread, homemaking and traditional femininity, or is there something deeper going on?

This clip is an except from E181 of the Thinking Mind Podcast.

In this episode, Dr Alex is joined by Dr Rosy Blunstone to explore the psychology of the tradwife phenomenon: why tradwife content has become so popular online, what it offers women psychologically, and why it may also be more ...

The Thinking Mind is taking a short break, but there is plenty happening behind the scenes.

In this quick update, Dr Alex shares what listeners can catch up on now, what is coming next, and why the podcast is making a move towards YouTube. There are also new episodes on meditation, doing difficult things, schizophrenia and more already in the works.

If you want to support the show like, comment and subscribe to our YouTube channel: h...

In this exceprt from E179 of the Thinking Mind Podcast, Dr Paul Eastwick explains the “EvoScript” — the popular version of evolutionary psychology that many people have absorbed from online dating advice, red pill content, the manosphere and social media.

Dr Eastwick argues that while “mate value” can matter in first impressions, the idea that your romantic fate is determined by looks, height, m...

Can we really love another person, or only the version of them we have created in our minds?

Today Dr Alex explores Obsession, directed by Curry Barker, a psychological horror film about desire, consent, fantasy and the darker side of romantic love.

Using the film’s central premise (a young man wishes for the woman he loves to become completely devoted to him) Alex examines the difference between love and obsession, the dangers...

This week Dr Alex speaks with psychologist and philosopher Dr Joel Vos about what it really means to live a meaningful life. They explore why modern culture can leave people feeling distracted, disconnected and overly focused on external goals, and how existential psychotherapy can help people reconnect with what matters most to them.

The conversation also examines the relationship between meaning, mental health and radicalisation. ...

This is an excerpt from E178 of the Thinking Mind Podcast. In this clip, Alex speaks with neuroscientist and author Dr Dean Burnett about whether depression should really be understood as a disease.

They discuss the disease model of mental health, why depression is more complicated than a simple biological fault, and why mental health problems cannot always be treated in the same way as physical illnesses. Dean explains why ...

Today Dr Alex speaks with consultant neuropsychiatrist and immunopsychiatry researcher Dr Tom Pollack about one of the strangest and most urgent questions emerging in mental health today: can AI chatbots contribute to delusions, psychosis, conspiracy thinking and changes in belief?

They discuss the rise of so-called “AI psychosis” or AI-associated delusions, and how prolonged conversations with tools like ChatGPT, Claude...

This is an excerpt from E175 of the Thinking Mind Podcast.

In this episode, Alex is joined by Professor Kalina Christoff Hadjiilieva, Professor of Psychology at the University of British Columbia and one of the world’s leading researchers on the neuroscience of thought.

We explore why our relationship with thought may be one of the most important factors in our wellbeing. Kalina explains why spontaneous thought ...

Is being a tradwife really just about baking bread, homemaking and traditional femininity, or is there something deeper going on?

In this episode, Dr Alex is joined by Dr Rosy Blunstone to explore the psychology of the tradwife phenomenon: why tradwife content has become so popular online, what it offers women psychologically, and why it may also be more complicated (and less traditional) than it first appears.

This conversation exam...

This is an excerpt from: E177 - Why You Must Deal With Self-Hate.

Low self-esteem doesn’t always look like insecurity. In this clip, Dr. Alex explains three patterns of low self-esteem and self-hate: becoming aggressive, becoming submissive, or becoming avoidant. Drawing on Karen Horney’s ideas in *Neurosis and Human Growth*, he explores how poor self-esteem can show up as narcissism, people-pleasing, dependency,...

In this episode of The Thinking Mind, Dr. Alex is joined by Michael Cohen and Jonathan Kirschner, hosts of That ’70s Movie Podcast, to discuss Woody Allen’s 1988 film Another Woman, starring Gena Rowlands, Ian Holm, Mia Farrow and Gene Hackman.

Another Woman is a quiet but devastating psychological drama about Marion Post, a philosophy professor whose life begins to unravel when she overhears the therapy sessions of a yo...