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To expand upon your point, biology lucked out with Carl Linnaeus. It so happened that Linnaeus's methods of classifying and naming biological organisms happened

To expand upon your point, biology lucked out with Carl Linnaeus. It so happened that Linnaeus's methods of classifying and naming biological organisms happened to correspond very well to other scientifically relevant concepts (genetics, etc.)[0]. We have no similar guarantee that the same applies to classifications of behaviors. That said - and let me qualify this by saying I have many complaints with the DSM (particularly the DSM V) - the fact that the DSM classifications may not be helpful for research purposes does not mean that they are not helpful for clinical treatment. Clinicians who use it properly (a big caveat) use it to ensure that they are all using a common vocabulary, though with an understanding that the vocabulary is imperfect. This is why I get very frustrated when I see online discussions about mental disorders devolve into recitations of the DSM diagnostic criteria as if they were checklists. The DSM provides a convenient library, but the clinician still has to identify which portions are relevant and which are not, and to write the "code" that glues those relevant portions together. [0] Not that they weren't without fault, but they were an important early effort that has been revised in modern day.

neurotech1 13y ago
I agree with your comments about the DSM. One of my biggest frustrations is that except for a subset of neuropsychologists, they have very poor understanding of how neurophysiology correlates with various "diagnosis".
mtdewcmu 13y ago
Biology was far luckier in general, in that biology is a much better subject for scientific inquiry than psychology. Good science has to work very hard to keep subjectivity and bias at bay; they are constantly and insidiously trying to creep in, and they are poison. Psychologists have the unlucky job of trying to scientifically study subjectivity and bias itself. I don't think it's really possible to make psychology a rigorous science; the subject may simply be out of reach.
lutusp 13y ago
> We have no similar guarantee that the same applies to classifications of behaviors. Not yet, anyway. In the long term, there's hope that neuroscience will uncover root causes in genetics and other objective disciplines, thus moving beyond psychology entirely. This is a future goal, not at all something just around the corner. On the other hand, psychology has been trying to crack this egg since before the Civil War and has gotten nowhere. Notice that, when President Obama launched his new research program, he called it the "brain initiative", not the "mind initiative". This was a not-so-subtle signal that psychology is no longer looked on as the cutting edge of mental research. > That said - and let me qualify this by saying I have many complaints with the DSM (particularly the DSM V) - the fact that the DSM classifications may not be helpful for research purposes does not mean that they are not helpful for clinical treatment. That's true, but clinical treatment can't go anywhere without knowing causes, which the DSM -- and psychiatry and psychology -- don't address. This issue is discussed in the NIMH link I provided in my prior post, where the NIMH director provides much detail on the problems caused by addressing only symptoms, not causes. > The DSM provides a convenient library, but the clinician still has to identify which portions are relevant and which are not, and to write the "code" that glues those relevant portions together. But whenever a clinician goes beyond the DSM, s/he enters uncharted territory. This subjective territory led Tom Widiger, who served as head of research for DSM-IV, to say, "There are lots of studies which show that clinicians diagnose most of their patients with one particular disorder and really don't systematically assess for other disorders. They have a bias in reference to the disorder that they are especially interested in treating and believe that most of their patients have."
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > In the long term, there's hope that neuroscience will uncover root causes in genetics and other objective disciplines, thus moving beyond psychology entirely. The idea that understanding the biological/physiological basis of behavior is part of psychology has been part of the field since the 19th century. Establishing those things -- whether under the comparatively new label of neuroscience or any of the older labels under which such exploration have been done (e.g., "psychobiology") -- isn't "moving beyond psychology", its just grounding psychology in the same way that physics grounds chemistry, and establishing that grounding has always been understood to be part of chemistry. > That's true, but clinical treatment can't go anywhere without knowing causes, which the DSM -- and psychiatry and psychology -- don't address. This is simply false: psychology and psychiatry do address causes, and even the DSM does in some cases.
  - lutusp 13y ago
    > The idea that understanding the biological/physiological basis of behavior is part of psychology has been part of the field since the 19th century. Yes, but as an unrealized goal. William James stated that it was an unrealized goal in the late 19th century, and the director of the NIMH mentioned the same issue a few months ago as he ruled that the DSM would no longer be accepted as the basis for scientific research proposals, for the simple reason that it has no scientific content: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/about/director/2013/transforming-diagnosis.shtml http://www.nimh.nih.gov/about/director/2013/transforming-dia... >> ... clinical treatment can't go anywhere without knowing causes, which the DSM -- and psychiatry and psychology -- don't address. > This is simply false: psychology and psychiatry do address causes, and even the DSM does in some cases. Tell that to the NIMH, which has ruled against use of the DSM for the best of reasons -- the claim is false. A quote from the above link: "The goal of this new manual, as with all previous editions, is to provide a common language for describing psychopathology. While DSM has been described as a “Bible” for the field, it is, at best, a dictionary, creating a set of labels and defining each. The strength of each of the editions of DSM has been “reliability” – each edition has ensured that clinicians use the same terms in the same ways. The weakness is its lack of validity." "Unlike our definitions of ischemic heart disease, lymphoma, or AIDS, the DSM diagnoses are based on a consensus about clusters of clinical symptoms, not any objective laboratory measure. In the rest of medicine, this would be equivalent to creating diagnostic systems based on the nature of chest pain or the quality of fever. Indeed, symptom-based diagnosis, once common in other areas of medicine, has been largely replaced in the past half century as we have understood that symptoms alone rarely indicate the best choice of treatment." So tell me -- which word didn't you understand?

neurotech1 13y ago

I agree with your comments about the DSM. One of my biggest frustrations is that except for a subset of neuropsychologists, they have very poor understanding of how neurophysiology correlates with various "diagnosis".

mtdewcmu 13y ago

Biology was far luckier in general, in that biology is a much better subject for scientific inquiry than psychology. Good science has to work very hard to keep subjectivity and bias at bay; they are constantly and insidiously trying to creep in, and they are poison. Psychologists have the unlucky job of trying to scientifically study subjectivity and bias itself. I don't think it's really possible to make psychology a rigorous science; the subject may simply be out of reach.

lutusp 13y ago

> We have no similar guarantee that the same applies to classifications of behaviors. Not yet, anyway. In the long term, there's hope that neuroscience will uncover root causes in genetics and other objective disciplines, thus moving beyond psychology entirely. This is a future goal, not at all something just around the corner. On the other hand, psychology has been trying to crack this egg since before the Civil War and has gotten nowhere. Notice that, when President Obama launched his new research program, he called it the "brain initiative", not the "mind initiative". This was a not-so-subtle signal that psychology is no longer looked on as the cutting edge of mental research. > That said - and let me qualify this by saying I have many complaints with the DSM (particularly the DSM V) - the fact that the DSM classifications may not be helpful for research purposes does not mean that they are not helpful for clinical treatment. That's true, but clinical treatment can't go anywhere without knowing causes, which the DSM -- and psychiatry and psychology -- don't address. This issue is discussed in the NIMH link I provided in my prior post, where the NIMH director provides much detail on the problems caused by addressing only symptoms, not causes. > The DSM provides a convenient library, but the clinician still has to identify which portions are relevant and which are not, and to write the "code" that glues those relevant portions together. But whenever a clinician goes beyond the DSM, s/he enters uncharted territory. This subjective territory led Tom Widiger, who served as head of research for DSM-IV, to say, "There are lots of studies which show that clinicians diagnose most of their patients with one particular disorder and really don't systematically assess for other disorders. They have a bias in reference to the disorder that they are especially interested in treating and believe that most of their patients have."

dragonwriter 13y ago
> In the long term, there's hope that neuroscience will uncover root causes in genetics and other objective disciplines, thus moving beyond psychology entirely. The idea that understanding the biological/physiological basis of behavior is part of psychology has been part of the field since the 19th century. Establishing those things -- whether under the comparatively new label of neuroscience or any of the older labels under which such exploration have been done (e.g., "psychobiology") -- isn't "moving beyond psychology", its just grounding psychology in the same way that physics grounds chemistry, and establishing that grounding has always been understood to be part of chemistry. > That's true, but clinical treatment can't go anywhere without knowing causes, which the DSM -- and psychiatry and psychology -- don't address. This is simply false: psychology and psychiatry do address causes, and even the DSM does in some cases.
- lutusp 13y ago
  > The idea that understanding the biological/physiological basis of behavior is part of psychology has been part of the field since the 19th century. Yes, but as an unrealized goal. William James stated that it was an unrealized goal in the late 19th century, and the director of the NIMH mentioned the same issue a few months ago as he ruled that the DSM would no longer be accepted as the basis for scientific research proposals, for the simple reason that it has no scientific content: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/about/director/2013/transforming-diagnosis.shtml http://www.nimh.nih.gov/about/director/2013/transforming-dia... >> ... clinical treatment can't go anywhere without knowing causes, which the DSM -- and psychiatry and psychology -- don't address. > This is simply false: psychology and psychiatry do address causes, and even the DSM does in some cases. Tell that to the NIMH, which has ruled against use of the DSM for the best of reasons -- the claim is false. A quote from the above link: "The goal of this new manual, as with all previous editions, is to provide a common language for describing psychopathology. While DSM has been described as a “Bible” for the field, it is, at best, a dictionary, creating a set of labels and defining each. The strength of each of the editions of DSM has been “reliability” – each edition has ensured that clinicians use the same terms in the same ways. The weakness is its lack of validity." "Unlike our definitions of ischemic heart disease, lymphoma, or AIDS, the DSM diagnoses are based on a consensus about clusters of clinical symptoms, not any objective laboratory measure. In the rest of medicine, this would be equivalent to creating diagnostic systems based on the nature of chest pain or the quality of fever. Indeed, symptom-based diagnosis, once common in other areas of medicine, has been largely replaced in the past half century as we have understood that symptoms alone rarely indicate the best choice of treatment." So tell me -- which word didn't you understand?