Journal article
Theories of Psychopathology: Introduction to a Special Section
Journal of psychopathology and clinical science, Vol.132(3), pp.223-227
04/01/2023
DOI: 10.1037/abn0000824
PMCID: PMC10353037
PMID: 37126055
Abstract
This special section on theories of psychopathology provides an opportunity to collect the emergent, cross-cutting scholarship that is challenging traditional approaches to understanding mental illness. Here, we appraise the state of theory in the field, and emphasize the pitfalls of working in the context of overly flexible, unchallenged, and essentially unchallengeable theoretic models, such as the biopsychosocial model, which we argue has become the de facto theoretic model for our field. We further posit that theoretic shortcomings are contributing to the often-referenced pessimism regarding our progress in understanding and treating mental illness, and introduce the charge of the authors of the papers in this section to articulate novel, falsifiable theories of psychopathology. We briefly touch on the intertwined issue of how to define psychopathology, and discuss a key issue raised by the array of papers comprising the section, namely how to conceptualize the spatiotemporal boundaries of complex causal systems. We then use this schematic for understanding how these theories relate to each other and to the vanilla biopsychosocial model they are vying to replace. Ultimately, it is our belief and hope that progress in theoretic thinking will catalyze faster progress in research and improvements to and novel developments in clinical prevention and intervention efforts.
This paper introduces a special section of the Journal of Psychopathology and Clinical Science on “Theories of Psychopathology.” In this piece, we discuss the state and importance of theory in the field, and outline the goal of and introduce the papers included in the special section.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Theories of Psychopathology: Introduction to a Special Section
- Creators
- Jerillyn S. Kent - The University of Texas at DallasKristian Markon - University of MinnesotaAngus W. MacDonald - University of Minnesota
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- Journal of psychopathology and clinical science, Vol.132(3), pp.223-227
- DOI
- 10.1037/abn0000824
- PMID
- 37126055
- PMCID
- PMC10353037
- NLM abbreviation
- J Psychopathol Clin Sci
- ISSN
- 2769-7541
- eISSN
- 2769-755X
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 04/01/2023
- Academic Unit
- Psychological and Brain Sciences
- Record Identifier
- 9984631940402771
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