Disinhibition is when people lack social restrictions due to factors like trauma, mental illness, or brain damage. Treatment depends on the cause, and psychotherapy can help habitually uninhibited people. It’s important to understand the condition and approach it with empathy.
Disinhibition means that people lack certain restrictions that are generally considered to be part of participating in society. Such behavior results from numerous factors including lack of maturity, repeated trauma, mental illness, or deterioration of the brain via brain damage or disease affecting cognition. Drugs or alcohol can also cause temporary disinhibition.
There are many different types of disinhibition, from people having extreme emotional outbursts to excessively sharing very private details about their lives with others. Alternatively, some behaviors include things like exposing or handling the genitals in public or not using the bathroom. There may also be a lack of respect for conventions such as respecting the personal space of others.
Treatment of disinhibition focuses on the cause first. The severely inebriated person who sings loud enough to disturb the neighbors has a temporary case that resolves when blood alcohol levels drop. This person may need to be moved to a safe place, such as a prison or hospital, until sufficient recovery has been made. Uninhibited people may not only act rudely, but also act in ways that may be self-harming or harmful to others.
When disinhibition results from conditions like mania and can be one of the core symptoms of a manic person, it may take time to find a way to recover through drug therapy for conditions like bipolar disorder. In the meantime, the person would need close observation to ensure that they are not posing a risk to themselves or behaving in ways that are socially unacceptable or illegal. Hospitalization could be considered until normal inhibitions are restored.
In people with incurable traumatic or deteriorating brain conditions, coping with this condition can be more difficult. In a supportive environment, caregivers may try to make options available to help the person express fewer behaviors. For example, reminding people to use the bathroom or distracting them with alternatives when disinhibiting behavior occurs can help reduce the expression of the condition. It is not always possible to completely eliminate such behaviors.
Psychotherapy is considered a good option for people who are habitually socially uninhibited. Those who find themselves consistently sharing too much private information in the social environment may find that they are lonely and have few friends. Such oversharing can come from some of the personality disorders and also manifests itself in people who experienced significant abuse as children, especially sexual abuse, and grew up with an immature sense of social boundaries as a result. Therapy can help deal with traumatic experiences and focus on behavior training that clears boundaries.
In most cases, this condition should be understood as a result of the person’s illness or maturity level, and not as the person’s deliberate attempts to upset others. Knowing that this behavior has a cause helps people deal with it more compassionately. In many cases, the disinhibition is temporary or responds to treatment, but in severe cases, brain disease creates a permanent state of it, and all efforts go toward kind, empathetic, downplaying behaviors.
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