Hey there carers,

Thank you for sticking with us thus far and we hope you continue to do so in the foreseeable future as well. We will be taking a very short break till the first week of May and will go back to our regular schedule of a new episode every Monday thereon. In the meantime, we hope you get a chance to listen to some of our older episodes. Just like in life, we have grown and improved from Episode 1 last year. We hope you get to see that too. See you back in May!

This episode starts at a party, takes a hard left into pseudoscience, and ends with us aggressively side-eyeing half of modern psychology.
We're talking about bullshit psychological theories, the ones that sound legit, get repeated everywhere, and somehow survive despite having little to no actual scientific backing.

From Stockholm Syndrome to the five stages of grief, we break down how these ideas became mainstream, and why they probably shouldn't have. Along the way, we take detours into things like left-brain vs right-brain nonsense, the Mozart effect, primal therapy, and the particularly chaotic world of marketing psychology, where "science" is often just a very expensive rebrand of common sense.

This episode is peak comedy commentary meets scientific frustration, packed with quirky insights, offbeat learning, and just enough research to make you question every "fun fact" you've ever confidently repeated. Like most of our episodes, this starts as one of those seemingly random topics and slowly turns into something more uncomfortable: a reminder that just because something sounds scientific… doesn't mean it is.

Important links:

1. Stockholm syndrome - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome

2. Five stages of grief - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_stages_of_grief

3. An Empirical Examination of the Stage Theory of Grief - https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/205661#google_vignette

4. Cautioning Health-Care Professionals: Bereaved Persons Are Misguided Through the Stages of Grief - https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5375020/

5. Inkblot Test - https://www.kansashistory.gov/kansapedia/inkblot-test/17670

6. Rorschach test - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rorschach_test

7. Controversial psychology tests are often still used in US courts - https://www.newscientist.com/article/2233956-controversial-psychology-tests-are-often-still-used-in-us-courts/

8. Insights from an inkblot - https://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/health/insights-from-an-inkblot/article5335329.ece

9. Rorschach Inkblot Test: an overview on current status - https://ijip.in/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/18.01.075.20200804.pdf

10. Learning styles - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_styles

11. Roundup on Research: The Myth of 'Learning Styles' - https://onlineteaching.umich.edu/articles/the-myth-of-learning-styles/

12. Belief in Learning Styles Myth May Be Detrimental - https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2019/05/learning-styles-myth

13. Did an honesty researcher fabricate data? - https://www.npr.org/2023/07/28/1190663435/did-an-honesty-researcher-fabricate-data

Don't Know, Do Care is the brainchild of Ashmita, Sandy, and Prakhar, three friends from different backgrounds and interests. Ashmita works in sustainability, Sandy's an entrepreneur (puke) who'd rather not be, and Prakhar works with Sandy and is just trying to make sense of it all.

Three mildly confused friends, one weirdly specific topic each week. We don't know much, but we care just enough to talk about it for up to an hour each week.

Don't Know, Do Care is produced by "Ghar Pe Productions", edited by Prakhar and Sandy, critiqued (thoroughly) by Ashmita, and enjoyed mostly by our friends. Thanks for giving us a listen!