Finding Balance with Adderall: Responsibilization Discourses in Online Fora

Abstract

This thesis explores the discourses that surround psychopharmacological stimulant use in the online forum on reddit.com. The focus is on the negotiations of variable effects that people ascribe to the medication use. In the collective search for explanations and remedies, individuals become responsible for different aspects of their life in order to reach a balanced state. This state is constantly at flux and dependent on many variables, that are to be taken under control. Users thus have to monitor themselves and acquire self-knowledge, that is a based on listening to their embodied experience, and they have to adjust their bodies and daily routines. The idea of finding the right balance, that is informed by the embodied experiences, is closely connected to the ancient humoralist forms of governmentality. However, unlike in ancient humoralism, where balance necessarily meant adapting to the environment, biotechnologies have expanded the horizon of posssible modulations of bodies and selves, that may be achieved by the individuals themselves.

This thesis explores the discourses that surround psychopharmacological stimulant use in the online forum on reddit.com. The focus is on the negotiations of variable effects that people ascribe to the medication use. In the collective search for explanations and remedies, individuals become responsible for different aspects of their life in order to reach a balanced state. This state is constantly at flux and dependent on many variables, that are to be taken under control. Users thus have to monitor themselves and acquire self-knowledge, that is a based on listening to their embodied experience, and they have to adjust their bodies and daily routines. The idea of finding the right balance, that is informed by the embodied experiences, is closely connected to the ancient humoralist forms of governmentality. However, unlike in ancient humoralism, where balance necessarily meant adapting to the environment, biotechnologies have expanded the horizon of posssible modulations of bodies and selves, that may be achieved by the individuals themselves.