Talk:Hoarding disorder

Permission for publishment?

Is it really a good idea to show that guy's face in the 70s photo? It looks a bit like this pic was added here without the guy's knowledge, unless it's actually the photographer himself that is shown. 85.4.75.65 (talk) 11:16, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

How

How do I help, or speak to my wife about this? There is not a room in the house that is not filled with junk. We had to buy a bigger house just to store the stuff. She does not seem to be open to talk about it and I do not want to hurt her. I NEED Help!!

Ward

Ward, there is significant evidence that compulsive hoarding is a medical problem. Unfortunately Wikipedia cannot offer medical advice. You might consider talking to a medical professional. -- The Anome 10:47, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

There are a number of links for support for hoarders and their loved ones at http://www.reclaimingdignity.com .

Possible removal of text

"How one person could fill an entire one-bedroom apartment with such garbage after only three years, leaves one wondering."

This appears to be a somewhat unconventional or unprofessional statement to make in an encyclopedia. Shouldn't it be sort of like a "just the facts, ma'am" approach?

I suggest the whole of that second example is removed. It's uncited and I don't think adds anything to the example already given. - Vaughan 13:09, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Vaughan and have removed the example. Sietse 14:33, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

messiness

Some expert should add information here or probably in a new article about messiness that also explains the distinction between it and compulsive hoarding. Comments can and should also be provided on at least some available relevant online help sites such as http://www.messies.com and http://clutterless.org and the abovementioned http://www.reclaimingdignity.com.

Wikipedia tries to avoid offering medical advice, but it can link to such advice and describe it generally, as it does on many less "controversial", less psychological, and more traditional health topics, e.g. Tinea versicolor. Another good and more relevant model for the present article is workaholism although that article is much too short considering how widespread and serious the problem of workaholism is. --Espoo 10:44, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Is "messiness" the same as clutter? Tinlinkin 05:50, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Bad link?

The link http://www.archive.org/details/MomsMessyHouse doesn't work for me. Is that just because I use Firefox instead of IE? Or should it just be deleted? Thue | talk 20:28, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I found this article that says it is a distinct medical disorder

It seems that they found that it is only distantly related to OCD, not even using the same area of the brain, and not responding to the usual OCD treatments.

http://discovermagazine.com/2004/oct/psychology-of-hoarding —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.100.45.84 (talk) 21:43, 1 May 2007 (UTC).

Thanks, I've incorporated that into the article. Some of the research described was already being mentioned (at least as of [1]). Kingdon (talk) 01:58, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

digital pack rat

i found the article on Digital Pack Rat and saw that "pack rat" links here. Is there room to make mention that acquiring digital items could be part of this concept also? Minnaert 21:02, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

Paxil bogeyman

Paxil was unfairly singled out as a risky drug in a way I felt violated NPOV. I tried to subdue this. However, my rework still sucks on many levels. The references supplied do not fully support the claims, nor do I have personal knowledge on these claims. The source I used for the list of drugs did not even spell several of the drugs correctly. MaxEnt 02:01, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Images Original research?

Where is the citation that shows that any of these images come from people who have been professionally diagnosed as compulsive horders?--Crossmr (talk) 05:51, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Provision/mention for compulsive data hoarding?

Hail everyone! :-)

After reading this article - And noting numerous strong similarities between the listed symptoms (Bibliomania in particular) and the rather messy way that I tend to organise data on my PCs hard drive - I would like to suggest that a section (And possibly a dedicated page) for compulsive hoarding of computer data could be added, possibly under the name "Datamania" or something similar. This might also correspond with what Minnaert mentioned above with regards to the Digital Pack Rats redirection.

Having carried out maintenance on the computer systems of several different people - And noticing that there is a frequent tendancy for people to keep piles of repeated data right across their filesystems - Data hoarding is probabally not an isolated thing, and personally I would consider it notable enough for Wikipedia. I would happily write up a whole section and page for this matter, but it would most likely be classed as original research and subject to a speedy deletion. :-(

Please copy any responses and comments to this suggestion to my Talk page as well. Many thanks in advance! :-)

DieselDragon (Talk) - 05 October 2008CE = 02:53, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

And anything like that would have to come with a citation. Unfortunately your personal observations fail WP:V and can't be used to establish the veracity or notability of content. A single mention in a MS quiz doesn't really make this worth mentioning--Crossmr (talk) 11:36, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Compulsive Hoarding: This article NEEDS to be edited

Compulsive hoarding is but a part of compulsiveness. As such, it stems from the basic fear of change, which seeks safety, security and stability. The article in its present form leaves the impression that hoarding = messiness, which is not true at all. The messy rooms seen on the page can easily be rooms of hysterical or even scizophrenic individuals.

It is true, rarely compulsive individuals may collect and store in disarray. Most of the times however, the compulsive collects and stores in an orderly manner, cataloguing and arranging stacks of items. These items are there to make the compulsive feel safer and secure. Therefore, examples of compulsive hoarding are:

1) Amassing collections of material items - CDs, DVDs, postal stamps, coins, tools, books etc. Typically the amounts are big, the person is either using them inefficiently or not at all. Most of the time these are well catalogued. Often there are more than one copy of each item.

2) Amassing collections of non-material possessions - publishing as many articles as possible, even most useless ones; signing up for as many work trips as possible; attending as many conferences as possible, even insignificant ones; working as many jobs as possible; working as many hours as possible; occupying as many positions as possible at work/church/club etc.

3) Data collection and its overprotection - every data bit is collected, catalogued in tables, copied multiple times to different media. These can be home picture/movies on CD/DVD, data from work, scanned information, personal data from old hard drives etc. The compulsive spends a lot of time and resources in building such data collections.

A borderline example would be stinginess and amassing of large sums of money. This can qualify as compulsive behavior, as long as the lifestyle of the individual is compulsive. However, non-compulsives can also be stingy or stack piles of money for other dysfunctional reasons.

-J. Polihronov November 27, 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.100.16.158 (talk) 18:05, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

My wife and I are living in our house just over four years, we have wedding presents everywhere, pictures in frames, newspapers, magazines, drawers with plenty pens , as regards the furniture once it's in the house she couldn't care less if it was never put in place,as regards reading material she doesn't go out and buy, but if it's brought into the house it can be put on a pile and may or may not be read in time but will only be thrown out if or when it is read, is all this possible a hoarding compulsive problem —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.16.219.141 (talk) 10:02, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Section On "Digital Hoarding" Should Be Removed

I question the inclusion of the section titled "digital hoarding." Compulsive hoarding, animal hoarding, and bibliomania are recognized diagnoses, and the references cited are sound. In contrast, "digital hoarding" is not a recognized condition, and the section included here is merely based on several superficial articles in popular-level publications.

68.187.137.5 (talk) 14:14, 19 September 2009 (UTC)Billy Floyd

Until all the extra external drives start to accumulate to where they fill up the house like old newspapers, it's really a non-issue. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots 14:16, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia may be guilty of this! But seriously, that section states "Digital hoarding is not a currently recognized subtype of compulsive hoarding by the DSM." This is odd, because earlier in the article it is stated "there is no definition of compulsive hoarding in accepted diagnostic criteria (such as the current DSM)." The Digital Hoarding section makes it seem like compulsive hoarding is in the DSM? Шизомби (talk) 02:22, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

Term "Disposophobia" should not link here

The term "disposophobia" was coined by Ron Alford, a professional specializing generally in organization and particularly in cleanup of hoarding situations. I'm not sure how it came to link here -- possibly someone created a stub entry on "disposophobia" that a Wikipedia editor decided didn't need its own entry. As Alford uses the term, "disposophobia" is a less serious, nonpathological condition; it is not synonymous with "compulsive hoarding," which is pathological.

The term might belong in this article in a passage defining compulsive hoarding by comparing it to less serious conditions. Don't think it should directly link, however.

--Athansor (talk) 20:04, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Though it's not an exact synonym, my understanding of the term "disposophobia" is that it is sufficiently closely related to warrant a redirect. If it is not a pathological condition then it is not a true phobia. Contains Mild Peril (talk) 10:01, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I know that the term "disposophobia" is used the Collyer Brothers article, and redirects to this one. Not sure of any other places it might be. I've been looking around through WP and Google Scholar (will try to hit some journal databases tomorrow) to see just what I think should be done with it. I didn't want to just axe it in the C. Bros. article before being sure about it. Some jerk on the Internet (talk) 21:06, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Levels of Hoarding

Discussions on the A&E website regarding the show Hoarders led me to a document published by the National Study Group on Chronic Disorganization (NSGCD) entitled The NGSCD Clutter Hoarding Scale. In sum, the document distinguishes five levels of hoarding with Level V (Roman number 5) being the worst. I will probably incorporate this document into this Wikipedia article at some point, unless someone else beats me to it. // Internet Esquire (talk) 05:30, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Case studies: is "chips" meant in the American sense?

"Both of the doors to the outside were blocked, so entry to the house was through the garage and the kitchen, where the table and chairs were covered with papers, newspapers, bills, books, half-consumed bags of chips and her children's school papers dating back ten years."

(my emboldening). Since this appears to be referenced to a print source, I can't check myself, but the footnote ref links to a website which appears to be American, so am I right in thinking that "chips" is used in the American sense (i.e. what we call "crisps" in Britain: crispy, usually potato-based snackfood available in various flavours) rather than the British meaning (i.e. "fries" - long, thinnish potato pieces fried and served hot)? This may seem like a trivial point, but the latter would be more problematic if left lying around for long periods, since foods with a high moisture content are more likely to grow mould, smell offensive, attract insects etc. "Crisps", on the other hand, tend to leave crumbs which get everywhere and are uncomfortable to stand or sit on. Can someone clarify which is meant? Contains Mild Peril (talk) 08:50, 23 December 2009 (UTC)