Can you explain the reasons behind your interests to others?

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OK, let's test this out.

Q: Ettina, why are you so interested in psychology?

A: Well, several reasons.

Firstly, I have kind of grown up with it, since I was sexually abused from the ages of 1-5 years old and first got counseling for PTSD at the age of 7. And my mother always asked me 'why' when I misbehaved as a kid, so I had to learn to introspect quite well from a young age. Plus my parents both have abuse histories as well, and my mother and I have often talked about the impact of sexual abuse, comparing the two of us. (My Dad doesn't talk much about feelings.)

Secondly, as an undiagnosed autistic kid, I never quite understood why others were so mysterious to me. I knew I was different, but couldn't explain how or why. I always felt a longing to find 'my people' and understand what made me so weird, and when I finally came across the answer to this, it really caught my interest.

Lastly, I'm a creative writer, and in order to write characters well, you need to understand psychology. Most writers don't formally study psychology, just go with implicit knowledge, but I find my formal study of psychology very helpful. I often research aspects of psychology literature relevant to my own characters. One of my pet peeves in a lot of writing is when characters react in ways that seem right to laypeople but are actually very unrealistic (such as epiphany cures) and I often use psychology research to avoid making similar mistakes myself. Furthermore, my interest in 'other worlds' is mainly an interest in 'other minds' - I like to try to get into the head of someone who thinks very differently from myself. And psychology research provides me with concrete information about other peoples' minds.


Yes, I'd say I'm pretty good at explaining why I'm interested in something. About the only interest I can't do this with is creative writing - I just feel like these stories start writing themselves in my head and push me to do something with them.

I wouldn't even try to explain my interests to anyone else, let alone try to explain the reasons behind them. Most people would probably die of boredom before I'd be finished.

Yeah, same for me.

I've never been asked "why do you like such-and-such?"

Usually people ask, "so how did you get interested in such-and-such?" or "how long has this been a hobby?"