Drop the language of disorder

Drop the language of disorder
Evidence-Based Mental Health Online First, published on September 21, 2012 as
Peter Kinderman,1 John Read,2 Joanna Moncrieff,3 Richard P Bentall1
1Institute of Psychology, Health and Society, University of Liverpool, Liverpool,
UK 2Psychology Department, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
3Mental Health Sciences Unit, University College London, London, UK
Correspondence to Professor Peter Kinderman, Institute of Psychology, Health
and Society, University of Liverpool, Liverpool L69 3GL, UK;
[email protected]
We may be on the cusp of a major paradigm shift in our thinking about
psychiatric disorders. The proposed revision of the American Psychiatric
Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) of Mental Disorders
franchise for the classification and diagnosis of human distress, which will lead
to the 5th edition (DSM-V), has served as a catalyst for a wide range of criticism
(most notably at www.ipetitions.com/petition/dsm5/). This has identified
serious inadequacies in the specific proposed revisions, and has also highlighted
scientific, philosophical, practical and humanitarian weaknesses in the diagnostic
approach to psychological well-being, underpinning the DSM. This debate
provides the opportunity to propose a more scientific grounded and clinically
useful system.
Diagnostic systems in psychiatry have always been criticised for their poor
reliability, validity, utility, epistemology and humanity. With great effort, and
standardised approaches, it is possible for reliable diagnoses to be generated.
But such practices are rarely adopted in clinical settings, and as we know, it is
entirely possible to reliably diagnose invalid diagnoses (the mere agreement
between diagnosticians is no guarantee that diagnoses correspond to meaningful
clusters of symptoms, with distinct pathophysiology and aetiology, which predict
the effectiveness of particular treatments).
The poor validity of psychiatric diagnoses—their inability to map onto any entity
discernable in the real world—is demonstrated by their failure to predict course
or indicate which treatment options are beneficial, and by the fact that they do
not map neatly onto biological findings, which are often nonspecific and cross
diagnostic boundaries. For example, depression and anxiety disorders are so
comorbid that it is often arbitrary which diagnosis is given to a patient;
schizophrenia symptoms are usually accompanied by mood symptoms and
overlap with those of bipolar disorder, and it is unclear as to whether bipolar
disorder is distinct from major depression.
In epistemological terms, diagnoses convey the idea that people’s difficulties can
prevents people from understanding how they might use their own resources to
consideration of the circularity of that argument, and the broader context (eg,
person’s social and interpersonal difficulties are often ignored in the hope that
the right medication regimen will achieve the desired return to normal
If implemented, the DSM-V would lead to a lowering of a swathe of diagnostic
thresholds. This would inflate the assumed prevalence of mental health
problems in the general population. This might be good news for pharmaceutical
companies, but is a potential threat to the general public and especially
vulnerable populations such as children and older people. The clients and the
general public are negatively affected by the continued and continuous
medicalisation of their understandable responses to their experiences;
responses that undoubtedly have distressing consequences which demand
helping responses, but which are better understood as normal individual
variation than as illnesses.
DSM-V would, if implemented, see an increased emphasis on the supposed
biological underpinnings of psychological distress, in that the language of
biological illness will be reinforced. This is again concerning, since most scientific
evidence points to the fact that complex, individual, interactions between
biological, social and psychological factors lead to these distressing experiences.
Finally, such approaches, by introducing the language of ‘disorder’, undermine a
humane response by implying that these experiences indicate an underlying
defect. We have seen significant opposition to the proposal that grief, in essence,
be pathologised (1) but the pathologising of normality in DSM-V is more
pervasive, and is shared in all medical diagnostic systems. The death of a loved
one can lead to a profound, and long-lasting, grieving process. War is hell. In
what sense is it a ‘disorder’ if we remain distressed by bereavement after 3
months or if we are traumatised by the experience of industrialised military
conflict? It is important for all of us to ensure that our children learn
appropriately to regulate their emotions and grow up with a sense of moral and
social responsibility. But is it appropriate to invoke the concept of ‘disorder’
when children need extra help?
We need a wholesale revision of the way we think about psychological distress.
We should start by acknowledging that such distress is a normal, not abnormal,
part of human life—that humans respond to difficult circumstances by becoming
distressed. Any system for identifying, describing and responding to distress
should use language and processes that reflect this position. We should then
recognise the overwhelming evidence that psychiatric symptoms lie on continua
with less unusual and distressing mental states. There is no easy ‘cut-off’
between ‘normal’ experience and ‘disorder’. We should also recognise that
psychosocial factors such as poverty, unemployment and trauma are the most
strongly evidenced causal factors for psychological distress (2) although, of
course, we must also acknowledge that other factors—for example, genetic and
developmental—may influence the magnitude of the individual’s reaction to
these kinds of circumstances.
There are alternative systems for identifying and describing psychological
specific experiences or phenomena. Some international effort will be needed to
develop a shared lexicon, but it is relatively straightforward to generate a simple
list of problems that can be reliably and validly defined; for example, depressed
mood, auditory hallucinations and intrusive thoughts. There is no reason to
assume that these phenomena cluster into discrete categories or other simple
taxonomic structure. Indeed, the extent to which the phenomena co-occur may
be a function of development and social circumstances. As with many other areas
of medicine (particularly primary care) and wider civil society, such problems
lend themselves to communication between professionals and the planning of
services, especially if it is recognised that the operational definition should
include some measure of severity.
While some people find a name or a diagnostic label helpful, our contention is
that this helpfulness results from a knowledge that their problems are
explicable) and have some relief. Clients often, unfortunately, find that diagnosis
offers only a spurious promise of such benefits. Since, for example, two people
with a diagnosis of ‘schizophrenia’ or ‘personality disorder’ may possess no two
symptoms in common, it is difficult to see what communicative benefit is served
by using these diagnoses. Surely a description of a person’s real problems would
suffice? A description of an individual’s actual problems would provide more
information and be of greater communicative value than a diagnostic label.
For clinicians, working in multidisciplinary teams, the most useful approach
would be to develop individual formulations; consisting of a summary of an
individual’s problems and circumstances, hypothesis about their origins and
possible therapeutic solutions. This ‘problem definition, formulation’ approach
rather than a ‘diagnosis, treatment’ approach would yield all the benefits of the
current approach without its many inadequacies and dangers. It would require
all clinicians— doctors, nurses and other professionals—to adopt new ways of
thinking. It would also require the rewriting of most standard textbooks in
psychopathology (which typically use DSM diagnoses as chapter headings).
For researchers, trying to understand the causes of, and proper responses to,
such distress is actively hampered by the diagnostic systems currently used.
Whether we are pursuing biological, psychological or social causes of human
distress, an invalid diagnostic system is an active hindrance—if there is no
validity to a label such as ‘schizophrenia’, how can researchers finds its cause?
Researchers would be better advised to study the nature of, causes of and proper
response to specific, identified problems. Indeed, this process has already begun,
with a rich literature on social origins, biological substrate and consequences of
particular psychiatric phenomena (eg, hallucinations, paranoid delusions and
thought disorder) emerging over the last 20 years.
Clinicians are also likely to be more effective if they respond to an individual’s
particular difficulties rather than their diagnostic label.
Living with grief. Lancet (Editorial). 2012;379:589.
Read J, Bentall RP. Negative childhood experiences and mental health:
theoretical, clinical and primary prevention implications. Br J Psychiatry
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