I grew up in a time when going to therapy was taboo, and seen as a sign of failure or a lack of the resilience necessary to tough it out alone. Mental health terms were used flippantly as insults, or not used at all out of pervasive shame and stigma.
It’s a relief that in today’s world I can share with trusted friends when I’m feeling burnt out, depressed, anxious, or experiencing poor self-esteem. It’s a stark contrast how our parents’ generation glossed over sensitive subjects to project an illusion of ease and perfection, despite pain and dysfunction laying just beneath the surface.
Dr Sascha Kowalenko, a clinical psychologist, confirmed there is a distinct generational difference in how comfortable we are talking about mental health. She said that Boomers typically associated therapy with pathology or severe mental illness; something to be ignored or dealt with privately in homes or institutions.
The following generation, Gen X, came of age during the rise of cognitive and behavioural therapies, often regarding therapy as a pragmatic tool to ‘overcome’ psychological challenges, while still touting emotional self-reliance as a virtue.
“Millennials were the first generation to embrace therapy as not just treatment, but self-care,” Dr Kowalenko said.
“This generation speaks the language of boundaries, attachment styles and emotional regulation fluently, often before ever entering a clinical space.”
Dr Kowalenko said that while this has many benefits, it can also create an illusion of psychological mastery without the depth that comes from formal therapy or sustained inner work.
She said that some people overuse or misapply therapy terms, like narcissist, gaslighting or OCD, in ways that pathologise normal, if unpleasant, human behaviour. Used incorrectly, diagnostic labels can give people a reason to distance themselves to avoid discomfort in situations where mutual reflection or repair is not only possible but healthy and productive.
She explained that, like many significant cultural shifts, the increased adoption of therapeutic language is neither inherently positive or negative. It’s not the answer to all of our psychological woes, nor is it a sign that younger generations lack the resilience of their forebears.
Rather, it is a culturally understandable response to increased access to mental health information, greater mental health literacy and openness to the process of navigating difficult emotions. While this can do a lot of good, there is also a risk of over-therapising in a way that replaces curiosity with certainty, flattens complexity, and limits our ability to engage in meaningful, embodied healing and growth.
How does gender influence the rise of therapy culture?
Mental health is often framed as a universal experience that equally affects all human beings. But Dr Kowalenko said that in reality, therapisation is deeply gendered.
She explained that women more frequently self‑reflect, analyse relational dynamics, and engage in emotional labour. They are statistically more likely than men to engage in formal therapeutic services, participate in personal development and consume therapy-informed content.
“This is not coincidental but reflects broader sociocultural conditioning that positions women as the emotional managers of both themselves and their relationships,” she said.
“From early socialisation, women are often encouraged to be emotionally expressive, relationally attuned and responsible for the wellbeing of others. This leads to a higher baseline of emotional literacy but also a higher burden of emotional labour.”
While this often benefits women in terms of emotional literacy, insight and empathy, Dr Kowalenko cautioned that this dynamic can reinforce the idea that emotional development is solely women’s work.
“It can place disproportionate responsibility on women to therapise themselves, their friendships and their intimate relationships,” she said.
“It also contributes to a double bind: women are simultaneously expected to be emotionally fluent and criticised for being ‘too emotional’ or ‘over-therapised’.”
While opportunities for men’s emotional development are improving, they often avoid overt therapy speak that could associate them with femininity, reflecting a persistent societal discomfort with male vulnerability.
“The act of making sense of oneself through psychological frameworks does not occur in a vacuum,” she said.
Therapy is intrinsically linked with our historical context of patriarchy and outdated gendered norms. Without taking these broader cultural influences into account, any discussion about a rise in therapisation fails to understand the multi-layered reasons women seek language to understand themselves and their place in the world.
“At its best, this kind of therapising reflects greater emotional and psychological awareness,” said Dr Kowalenko.
“Many women are better able to name feelings, recognise patterns and articulate boundaries than previous generations. For some, this is deeply empowering, particularly for women who were raised to minimise their emotional experiences.”
Dr Sascha Kowalenko, clinical psychologist.
The memeification of mental health: Is social media therapy culture harmful?
The explosive increase in mental health content available online has been positive in many ways. But Dr Kowalenko reminds us that it can also lack nuanced, evidence-based information grounded in solid psychological concepts and theories, without adequate support to translate these ideas into tangible, life-improving change.
“Therapy is a disciplined process of working with another person to deepen understanding, shift patterns and build capacity,” she said.
“It often involves discomfort, complexity and deep personal accountability.”
It is more than just venting, introspection, or applying labels to behaviour – it’s a structured, interpersonal experience with evidence and safeguards to ensure effectiveness, safety, and ethics.
For reasons like cost, discomfort or accessibility, many of us now rely at least partially on the internet to analyse our inner worlds. Dr Kowalenko said that social media’s embrace of psychological content has many upsides, particularly normalising language once confined to therapy rooms and reducing stigma and shame.
“The downside is that social media rewards confidence, relatability, and certainty – not accuracy or nuance,” she said.
“Algorithms amplify simplified explanations, personal anecdotes framed as universal truths and advice delivered without accountability.”
Despite having greater access than ever before to self-help content online, mental health indicators continue to decline.
“This contradiction reveals something important: consuming psychological information is not the same as integrating it,” said Dr Kowalenko.
“Insight, on its own, does not create change.”
She sees many people therapising themselves or others through trendy terms found online with unfounded confidence or oversimplified concepts.
“They can quote attachment theory, name-check trauma responses, or identify toxic dynamics. But too often, this becomes intellectualising without embodiment, labelling without accountability, and narrating without change.
“Knowing the language of healing is not the same as doing the work of healing.”
She cautions us to look out for illusory expertise in mental health spaces online, especially with the rise of unqualified mental health ‘coaches’ who emanate confidence without sufficient qualifications or skills.
“Real change requires reflection, accountability and often the guidance of a trained professional, especially when trauma, mental illness or entrenched relational patterns are involved,” she said.
Our consumption of advice without the support to implement it leaves many people stuck in analysis paralysis, bingeing mental health podcasts about emotional regulation without ever applying it to their own behaviour in relationships. People confuse setting healthy boundaries with emotional avoidance, or inadvertendly disempower themselves by blaming their problems on intergenerational trauma or a dysregulated nervous system while disregarding the impact of their choices.
“This is the shadow side of therapy culture,” said Dr Kowalenko.
“It gives the illusion of psychological maturity without the discomfort, mess, and responsibility that real growth demands.”
Combining insight with integration: how to use therapy culture for good
Despite the risks of over-therapising oneself or others, Dr Kowalenko encourages women to continue using terms and practices that feel aligned and help them to open their minds and offer themselves gentle curiosity and self-compassion.
“The task is not to abandon therapy language, but to use it with humility, recognising its limits, respecting the complexity of human experience and remembering that insight alone is not transformation,” she said.
She explained that the difference can be as simple as asking yourself “could this be a trauma response?” rather than declaring “this is trauma”, and ending your self-inquiry there.
She also said that there is nothing wrong with relating to the mental health content you find online, especially if it makes you feel less alone. The key is to remember that their context is not the same as yours, and to avoid automatically adopting their interpretations or identities.
We must remember that social media is a highlight reel, and avoid comparing your real life healing journey to an edited, filtered, glamorous version you may see online.
“Therapy culture also risks the promotion of a performative model of healing, wherein disclosure and emotional literacy are seen as endpoints rather than part of an unfolding, relational process,” said Dr Kowalenko.
“Vulnerability becomes a form of currency, rather than a step toward transformation.”
While insights are valuable, psychological and emotional flexibility is critical to wellbeing and healthy relationships capable of withstanding conflict. Over-identification or reliance on diagnostic language can lead to rigid thinking patterns that can inhibit your growth
She said that what we are really seeing may not be women ‘over-therapising’ themselves or others, but a lack of support to use these tools in a safe and productive therapeutic way.
It makes perfect contextual sense that many women therapise themselves to understand their internal experience. It’s natural for humans to reach for language to understand and express their needs.
Dr Kowalenko said the secret is learning to hold this language gently, while maintaining open-minded curiosity, adaptability, and ability to apply nuance and context to therapeutic language and ideas.
Diagnoses and language are useful tools to guide treatment and give you the vocabulary to ask for the support you need. Integrating therapy terms while also holding space for yourself as a complex, ever-evolving being may feel messy and uncertain at times. But with patience and the appropriate support, it can reveal your unique path to healing and personal growth.
