Welcome to From Insults to Respect. From time to time I have been discussing two distinct ways of looking at the nature of depression–the medical model and what we may wish to refer to as the creative temperament view.
The medical model views people who experience depression as having an illness that requires, as the first line of treatment, taking pills that are called “antidepressants.” The enormously wealthy pharmaceutical industry puts its full promotional apparatus behind this approach.
The creative temperament view lacks the backing of any huge corporate interest, but news of it trickles in from a variety of sources. 
For example, those interested in the history of psychology may learn how the brilliant psychologist and philosopher William James viewed his “bass notes of experience” (see “William James’s Personal Bout with a ‘Mental Illness“). He wrote that many so called “healthy-minded” individuals believe that those who worry are “morbid-minded” and “diseased,” but it may very well be true that “the world’s meaning most comes home to us when we lay them most to heart.” He, himself, learned to appreciate these visits of melancholy as something of extraordinary value, and stated that,
“there is no doubt that healthy-mindedness is inadequate as a philosophical doctrine, because the evil facts which it refuses positively to account for are a genuine portion of reality; and may after all be the best key to life’s significance, and possibly the only openers of our eyes to the deepest levels of truth.”
From there, James reviewed the biography of some of the most creative people in history, and noted that they often experienced depression.
Ms. Laren Stover
A more recent example of someone discussing depression in a manner consistent with the creative temperament view appeared in a New York Times article titled “The Case for Melancholy.” There we learn from American writer Laren Stover about her own personal experiences. After telling us of her weariness of all those folks on the internet promising to show us how to be delightfully happy in just a few short steps, she writes:
“Whatever happened to experiencing the grace of melancholy, which requires reflection: a sort of mental steeping, like tea? What if all this cheerful advice only makes you feel inadequate? What if you were born morose?”
Laren continues to weave her creative images of melancholy with such words as:
“Sadness has a bad reputation. But I soon came to feel that melancholy — the word itself is late Latin from the Greek melancholia — is a word with a romantic Old World ring, with a transient beauty like the ring around the moon.”
Most recently, I discovered a particularly revealing example of someone who experienced her depression in a manner similar to Prof Willam James and Ms. Stover.
Joni Mitchell’s Experience
Reckless Daughter, is a new biography of seven-time Grammy Award winner Joni Mitchell. Prior to reading it, I had already gotten a sense of Joni’s view of melancholy from her soulful rendition of her song “Hejira.” There she sings,
I’m sitting in some cafe
A defector from the petty wars
That shell shock love away
There’s comfort in melancholy
When there’s no need to explain
It’s just as natural as the weather
In the moody sky today
Now, having read the book, I found a clearer sense of this sensitive soul’s perspective.
In 1971, Joni released her album Blue, which, according to her biographer David Yaffe, deals with “the feeling underneath the tears, before the tears, the surge and power of heartbreak.” Although the success of the album might make you think she was thrilled, and perhaps there was some of that, but it was a time of a great depression. There must be more to life, she figured. How does she handle this?
“I bought every psychology book I could lay my hands on. Jung, Freud, theology, self help, psychiatry.” She ended up throwing them all against the wall. 
And then she was introduced to Nietzsche, and learned from him that to live is to suffer, to survive is to find meaning in the suffering.
She decided to spend some extensive alone time in nature along the beautiful coast of British Columbia. It was there that she discovered that “Depression can be the sand that makes the pearl…. Most of my best work came out of it. If you get rid of the demons and the disturbing things, then the angels fly off, too. There is the possibility, in the mire, of an epiphany.”
Concerns that she was dealing with were, “How am I going to get back in the saddle? And what about the audience? Would you still love me if you knew what I was really like?” 
And then, in the midst of all of these swirling heartfelt feelings, the words and music for her next album, For the Roses, began to flow through her soul.
An interesting characteristic of Joni is that she so values her melancholy that she doesn’t like it when someone tries to cheer her up. “If somebody’s dark and brooding, you’re better off brooding beside them,” she explains. “Don’t go acting cheerful. You’re just a reminder of what they’re not. They’ll hate you for it. The last thing you want is a cheerful person when you’re down like that.”
Of course, there is a great deal more to the life of Joni Mitchell. Nevertheless, I shall pause here, for I think I achieved my purpose of giving readers an added sense of the creative temperament view of depression. In one of her interviews that appears in Yaffe’s biography, Joni explicitly rejected the idea that she was mentally ill.
Was she wrong? Would she have been better off fully accepting the notion that she was suffering from a mental illness? Is her experience with depression really no different from diabetes, as many claim?
Certainly, there were times during which she experienced suffering. But just as suffering occurs as part of the process of giving birth, it can also be part of the process of giving life some deeper, truer meanings to this crazy, incredible experience we call life.
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
Myeshia Johnson’s husband, Sgt. La David Johnson, died in an ambush in Niger on Oct. 4, 2017. Shortly afterwards, Mrs. Johnson received a condolence call from President Trump. Mrs. Johnson then told ABC news that the president struck a callous tone during their conversation–telling her, “He knew what he signed up for”–and that he repeatedly forgot her husband’s name.
Verifying what Mrs. Johnson heard was her long time friend, Frederica Wilson, a Texas congresswoman. Wilson was in the car with Mrs. Johnson when the president’s call came, and Mrs. Johnson chose to put the call on speaker mode so her friend could hear.
Upon hearing Wilson’s take on what happened, the president publicly derided her as “wacky” and called her account a “total lie.” In doing so, he indirectly said that the grieving widow had lied, since Wilson’s account of what happened matches what the widow said. Additionally, he publicly insulted the widow’s close friend.
Then, the White House Chief of Staff John Kelly appears in the White House briefing room seeking to defend the president and clarify what had occurred.
Kelly further explained that in these cases presidents typically write a letter, and he recommended to Trump that he not make calls because “it’s not the phone call that parents, family members are looking forward to.” Nevertheless, Trump elected to make phone calls in the cases of four young men who were killed in Niger. I note here that Trump also chose to politicize his calls by going before the national press to inform the public of his decision, and that former President Obama did not make such phone calls.
Let me tell you what my best friend, Joe Dunford, told me — because he was my casualty officer [when my son was killed in action]. He said, Kel, he was doing exactly what he wanted to do when he was killed. He knew what he was getting into by joining that 1 percent. He knew what the possibilities were because we’re at war. And when he died, in the four cases we’re talking about, Niger, and my son’s case in Afghanistan — when he died, he was surrounded by the best men on this Earth: his friends.”
“That’s what the President tried to say to four families the other day. I was stunned when I came to work yesterday morning, and broken-hearted at what I saw a member of Congress doing. A member of Congress [Wilson] who listened in on a phone call from the President of the United States to a young wife, and in his way tried to express that opinion — that he’s a brave man, a fallen hero, he knew what he was getting himself into because he enlisted. There’s no reason to enlist; he enlisted. And he was where he wanted to be, exactly where he wanted to be, with exactly the people he wanted to be with when his life was taken.
“It stuns me that a member of Congress [Wilson] would have listened in on that conversation. Absolutely stuns me. And I thought at least that was sacred….”
Kelly finished up by further attacking Wilson, calling her an empty Barrel and falsely claiming she used a speech commemorating a building named for two fallen FBI agents to brag about her role in getting funds for the project. A video of the event shows that this did not happen, but Kelly, like his boss, Trump, has been refusing to apologize.
Here I’ll make a few general comments about condolence calls, and then give my personal critique of how the president and his chief of staff handled this situation.
Condolence calls, in my opinion, are about paying one’s respect to the bereaved. This involves giving the bereaved a chance to express their grief and joy for having had the opportunity to share a life together. For the person who is mourning, it is very important to know there are people who are supportive of what they are going through. So the condolence call lets those in the family, and others particularly close to the deceased, know you are thinking about them in their time of need. It also gives you an opportunity to share in that grief.
The general format of what to say is something like this, “I am truly sorry for your loss.” Then we listen in a caring manner.
Upon making such comments, the bereaved party may often make some replies, and here again, listening in a caring manner is crucial. The main focus is on a caring tone, and saying things that you feel would be helpful to the bereaved, while avoiding attacking the bereaved for any perceived transgressions.
Another example of this occurred when then President George W. Bush met the families of slain soldiers. Some screamed at him and blamed him for their deaths. Bush stood and took it, holding them and weeping with them. Despite those verbal attacks occurring in a public setting, he never tried to defend himself by insulting any of the family members.
“I went over there [to Arlington National Cemetery] for an hour-and-a-half, walked among the stones, some of whom I put there because they were doing what I told them to do when they were killed.” 
Another miscalculation, in my opinion, came when Kelly took great offense that Mrs. Johnson chose to put her phone on speaker mode when Trump made the call to her. Framing it as violating something sacred seems to me as rather puzzling. Where did Kelly get this principle that it is somehow sacred for a grieving woman to not share a president’s call with others? This is certainly not anything I, or anyone else that I talked with, ever heard of. Rather than becoming angry about some unheard of principle of sacredness, it seems far more plausible that he was actually incensed that there was a witness to the call that didn’t go down very well.
Another thing that I would have also done is to let the public know that in order to better handle these types of situations I shall be inviting a large group of Gold Star family members to the White House to confer with them on their views about what is the best way for US presidents to respond whenever loved ones die in combat. After all, paying one’s respect to Gold Star families should not be about what the president views as helpful, but rather what the family members view as helpful.
Finally, from the personal perspective of this writer, Trump’s effort to make the condolence calls a way to make political points by saying Obama didn’t make such phone calls failed miserably to achieve its purpose.
On Sunday, November 5, 2017, I sat down in front of my computer to write this week’s blog post. Just as I put my fingers on my computer keyboard, a little message popped up in the lower right hand screen of my monitor. I glanced over to see that at a Texas church in the small town of Sutherland Springs numerous people had been shot and over twenty had died.
At one point, a camera showed a young woman who may have been one of the mothers whose child was killed. The anguish and horror on her face as she listened on a cellphone led to tears streaming down my face.
About a minute later, Ivy takes her mother’s hand and leads her back into the store. The rest of the shopping experience goes by without any further disruptions.
“Well,” says Aaron, “another week has gone by, so it is time to have another family meeting. We have these meetings because we love each other and we want to celebrate things that are going well for the family and we also want to figure out ways to solve problems so things keep getting better and better.”
“I like the way Joel and I played catch before dinner tonight,” says Aaron. “I was throwing these high flies to him, and he caught almost every one!” 
“Yeah, Dad,” Joel replies. Last night you yelled at me when it was time to go to bed. That’s not very respectful.”
Your insurance company requires that I must place a diagnosis on your health insurance form for you to access that service. I hear, so far, that you are concerned about….”
“Well, I wish we didn’t have to get into this labelling issue. Personally, I think it’s best to treat each person that I provide counseling to as an individual. It is understandable that many people don’t want to be placed in a diagnosis box, especially one known to be stigmatizing. But the insurance companies do require a diagnosis.”
In my journal article, I go on to propose a practical, more scientific alternative to the DSM. I call this alternative, the Classification and Statistical Manual of Mental Health Concerns (CSM). The first words in the CSM would be: “The developers of the CSM fully recognize that individuality outruns any classification system. It is for this reason that the CSM does not seek to classify anyone. Instead, it classifies the expressed concerns of individuals seeking to have their concerns addressed by a mental health service provider.”
On the other hand, some resisted the CSM approach. As I began to question them, seeking to figure out where exactly the disconnect was, I discovered that for some, it had to do with their belief that the DSM is a classification system based on solid principles of science and nothing could possibly be better. As I questioned them further, I discovered that their understanding of what a scientific classification system is designed to do was a bit incomplete. So, in today’s post, I explain in an easy to understand manner the nature of scientific classification systems, beginning with a description of a classification system with which we are all so very familiar–birds. This will enable us to see clearly why the bird classification system is useful as a scientific instrument. We will then look at the DSM classification system in light of what we learned about the bird system, and this will reveal the DSM‘s serious scientific shortcomings. Finally, we will compare and contrast the DSM system with the proposed CSM system in a manner that can make the superior scientific merits of the latter crystal clear.
As it turns out, there are some people very interested in birds.
Once scientists carefully define their general topic of interest, they describe different types of what they are interested in. So in our bird example, the scientist interested in them came up with a taxonomy that lists bluejays, pigeon, sparrow, and so forth as subtypes of the general category of birds, describing each subtype in a precise manner that can reliably distinguish each from the others on their list. Why bother to do this?
The main reason is that when they discuss their findings with others, they want to make sure they are using words that mean the same thing, and it is a great time saver. For example, let’s say John is a bird scientist and he says to Judy, another scientist, “I saw a bird the other day and I didn’t know what type it was; can you help me figure out what it is?” Notice that since both of these scientists know the meaning of a bird, it saves John quite a few words. Just imagine if instead every time John uses the word bird he had to say, “I saw something that had an endothermic vertebrae, characterized by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweight skeleton.” That’s quite a mouthful to have to say each and every time you refer to a bird. In this example, just saying bird saves a scientist about 30 words each time the word bird is used.
And let’s say John, the scientist, wants to find in a library some information about a particular type of bird. He would have to waste time looking at every single book in his library until he found one that seemed to be talking about what he was interested in.
This would result in John having to unnecessarily wade through numerous books on flying insects, of which there are hundreds of thousands of types, bats, and some fish that sort of can fly. With the current bird classification system, anyone can go to a library and quickly find the specific section that houses information on just birds. Similarly, placing the word “bird” in a search engine enables John to more quickly retrieve relevant information than would a less explicit definition.
“In the DSM-IV, each of the mental disorders is conceptualized as a clinically significant behavioral or psychological syndrome or pattern that occurs in an individual and that is associated with present distress (e.g., a painful symptom) or disability (i.e., impairment in one or more important areas of functioning) or with a significant increase risk of suffering death, pain, disability, or an important loss of freedom.”
The latest edition of the DSM (DSM-5) is just as vague. It begins, “Although no definition can capture all aspects of all disorders in the range contained in the DSM-5, the following elements are required.” Although it says the following elements are required, it then makes it clear that the elements that it lists are not required. As I provide the rest of the definition, notice the use of the word “or” and “usually.”
“A mental disorder is a syndrome characterized by clinically significant disturbance in an individual’s cognitive, emotion regulation, or behavior that reflects a dysfunction in the psychological, biological, or developmental process underlying mental functioning. Mental disorders are usually associated with significant distress in social, occupational, or other important activities. An expected or culturally approved response to a common stressor or loss, such as the death of a loved one, is not a mental disorder. Socially deviant behavior (e.g., political, religious, or sexual) and conflicts that are primarily between the individual and society are not mental disorders unless the deviance or conflict results from a dysfunction in the individual, as described above.” 
This is about as vague a descriptor as one can possibly conjure up. How about the descriptor “dysfunction?” This, too, is left to the subjective opinion of mental health providers who often have financial interests in declaring that someone has a mental disorder.
I, for one, am interested in a phenomenon that I, and others, call mental health concerns. Obviously there is wide interest in this. After all, there are numerous educational institutions that provide training to people so they can become credentialed to address mental health concerns. Numerous people actually voluntarily go to these educational institutions, devoting considerable time and expense. Once completing the credentialing requirements, they apply to their state credentialing board, pay a fee, and then after the board checks to see if all of its requirements have been fulfilled, it grants a license permitting the person to legally provide mental health services. That person then sets up a practice that offers mental health services. People wishing to access these services first devote some time to decide where to go. They then make an appointment, show up for the appointment, and then express their mental health concern to the mental health service provider. Aspects of all of this occur each and everyday and involves tens of thousands of people working in a coordinated fashion to have mental health concerns addressed in a professional manner.
This definition of a mental health concern requires all of the following items for a mental health concern to exist:
Also notice that no one doubts that each of the 4 listed items that, taken together, make up the mental health concern concept exists. Everyone agrees that there are people who seek mental health services in our society. Everyone agrees there are people licensed to provide mental health services. If you go further down the list, there is no question whatsoever, that these other conditions also exist. So the definition, I contend, meets the scientific standard that it describes the something of interest (mental health concern) in a clear and detailed manner, leaving no room for confusion or doubt. Once the CSM classification system comes to be fully developed, people would be able to use the term “mental health concern” as a short way to indicate a phenomenon that contains all four of its defining characteristics.
With regards to the various types of concerns that mental health service providers are asked to address by those seeking their services, two major types would be, 1. concerns expressed about oneself, and 2. concerns expressed about someone else. Under the headings of each of these two major types would be concerns regarding behavior, emotion, mood, meaning of life, death, dying, managing chronic pain, addiction, work, relationships, education, eating, cognition, sleep, hearing voices others don’t hear, and challenging life situations. This, of course, is just a preliminary list of types, and through survey data that ask psychologists and mental health advocacy groups about the various mental health concerns that they are asked to address, the list would become more fully developed.
The above explanation was designed to clarify just one of the reasons why the proposed CSM’s mental health concern concept provides a far more solid scientific foundation on which to build a classification system than the DSM‘s mental disorder concept. Despite the fact that many people have become convinced that the DSM‘s classification system is a sound scientific instrument, its definition is far more vague than how I propose defining a mental health concern.
Recently, I wrote a post titled “
“Oh, yes!” he cries enthusiastically. “He’s great!”
With little more than a public high school education, you managed to save a little money to open your own small convenience store. From your background, isn’t there anything indicating to you that Trump is not out to help people like you and those in your family and community?”
“Donald Trump, who was born rich, went to the finest private schools, was set up in the real estate business by his wealthy father, has always associated with rich people. He was over 70-years old when he began to run for president, and prior to that never showed any passion to help people like you and me. In fact, he has a long history of screwing people like us. You really think Trump cares one bit about people like you? Sure, he’ll say anything to get your vote, but we’ve seen him lie over and over again.”
His Trump University project ended up costing 30 million dollars to settle charges of fraud. You say he’s not beholden to anyone, but he and his associates are beholden to their own enormous financial interests. That’s why he has put the richest people he could find in top political positions.”
Under Obama, unemployment went from 10 percent to 5 percent, and the economy was improving steadily while he was in office. The fact that it has slightly further improved the first few months under Trump was during a time when there was not a single congressional bill passed designed to aid the economy. Despite this, you are completely convinced that the improvement, slight as it is, has to do with Trump?”
“OK, if that’s what you believe. Let’s move on to health care. Trump vaguely said when he was running for president that he had a great health plan he would enact as soon as he is elected. He said he will repeal and replace the Affordable Health Care Plan, and his own plan would be great and cover everyone. It turned out that he had no plan of his own. The plan he first supported came out of the House of Representatives, a bill that cut coverage for millions according to the Congressional Budget Office, so he plainly lied. Then, when the bill went to the Senate, they didn’t like it and so Trump ended up saying that the House bill was really mean. Then he supported the Senate bill that also cut services for millions of Americans. Nothing got passed, and he antagonized in the process the very people he has to work with if he is to get anything of his agenda through the congressional process. Why do you remain so gullible that he knows what he is doing and trust what he says?”
And people can climb over walls using rope ladders or cherry pickers. Drilling a little hole in the wall and sticking a stick of dynamite in it will blast a hole in the wall that will allow people to walk right through it. In a matter of a few years the wall will look like Swiss cheese. Maintaining the wall will cost tax payers like you and me billions and billions of dollars. His arguments for the need for the wall makes absolutely no sense.”
Now that we looked over today’s parable, let’s see if we can determine how well our Trump supporter utilized the three sets of skills that help to keep us from being gullible–Plausibility Checking, Trust Calibration, and Assessing Argumentation.
In the parable, the only evidence I can see that Bob used any plausibility checking occurs when he says Trump is a business man. Apparently that is enough for him despite the fact that the practice of business pits some business interests with other interests. When Ann points out that Trump’s business interests lie in big business and Bob’s business is a small business, this has no apparent effect on him.
The final skill set that helps to prevent people from being strongly gullible is “Assessing Argumentation.” In the parable, Bob does mention that Trump’s rhetoric appears to have led to the economy improving. But he does not explain why he is convinced that Trump’s rhetoric is the reason for the improved economy. Moreover, Bob’s support that somehow building a wall on the Mexico border makes sense is backed up with nothing more then declaring that we have to stop illegal immigration. There is not a single argument that he provides to defend that the wall would be a reasonable way to accomplish what he desires.
The scene, the offices of a large import, export business. Alice and Jill have just left their desks to go to lunch.
As examples of these skills, Mr. Mercier points out that studies demonstrate that participants find less compelling an argument from authority when the authority is not an authority in the relevant area, or if he or she has a vested interest. In an earlier post titled, “
Well, in thinking about this, I hasten to mention that Thomas Kuhn’s (1972) classic book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, rightly points out, for real change to occur in a branch of science, it is not enough to point out the weaknesses of a paradigm. There needs, as well, a new approach that is a distinct improvement over the old paradigm.
Regular readers know that I have, from time to time, been dealing with a conflict regarding psychiatric diagnosis. Said briefly, there are many people who immediately lose respect for anyone who questions the validity of the mental illness/mental disorder theoretical construct. On the other hand, many people have lost respect for the psychiatric profession because of its pathologizing approach of addressing concerns related to thinking, mood, behavior, or challenging life situations. Amidst this conflict, I have been trying to put forth on this blog, and in a number of other publishing outlets, an alternative approach with which the disputing parties can live in relative peace. 
Last year, I presented a paper on this topic at the American Psychological Association convention in Denver (see 
Albert Einstein created a revolution in the branch of science known as physics. Prior to the 20thcentury, physicists explained the propagation of light with the use of a theoretical construct known as the ether. There were experts in the ether who described ways to define it, along with its various characteristics. It was thought, for example, that the ether didn’t move in any direction, but it could vibrate. There was much discussion about an ether wind. And then Einstein came along and described the nature of light without resorting at all to the ether.
Criticism of the mental disorder construct began at the very beginning of American psychology when William James declared that it was nothing more than superficial medical talk. Criticism continued throughout the 20th century, and when the latest version of the DSM came out, there was a ton of media and professional articles that once again pointed out its numerous scientific shortcomings. Many throughout general psychology expressed deep concerns that psychologists utilizing the DSM approach had sold out to psychiatry and the pharmaceutical industry. Moreover, they bitterly complained that a paradigm that utilizes the mental disorder construct brings down respect for psychology as a legitimate branch of science. What can be done about this?
Well, in thinking about this I hasten to mention that Thomas Kuhn’s (1972) classic book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, rightly points out, for real change to occur in a branch of science, it is not enough to point out the weaknesses of a paradigm, there needs, as well, a new approach that is a distinct improvement over the old paradigm. So, is it possible to really come up with a distinct improvement over the current DSMapproach? I think our APA can do this easily if it set its mind to it, and it can do so within a year.
Let’s say Mary Doe comes to a licensed practicing psychologist and says she has been feeling a great deal of sadness much of her days. The psychologist, for verification purposes can say, “I hear you saying that you are concerned about how sad you have been feeling much of your days, and you would like us to work together to address this concern, is that correct?” If the service seeker says yes, this would verify that a mental health concern has been expressed, and what the concern is.
Well, there you have it. I only have seven minutes to present the paper, so many of the essential points that I would love to make have to be left out. There will be some time for questions and discussion, so some additional information could be shared then. And, for those who are interested, as I point out in my paper, they can now readily retrieve a far more complete presentation of my proposal by assessing the journal article I wrote that was just published last month.
Regular readers know that I have, from time to time, been dealing with a conflict regarding psychiatric diagnosis. Said briefly, there are many people who immediately lose respect for anyone who questions the validity of the mental illness/mental disorder theoretical construct. On the other hand, many people have lost respect for the psychiatric profession because of its pathologizing approach of addressing concerns related to thinking, mood, behavior, or challenging life situations. Amidst this conflict, I have been trying to put forth on this blog, and in a number of other publishing outlets, an alternative approach with which the disputing parties can live in relative peace. 
Last year, I presented a paper on this topic at the American Psychological Association convention in Denver (see 
Albert Einstein created a revolution in the branch of science known as physics. Prior to the 20th century, physicists explained the propagation of light with the use of a theoretical construct known as the ether. There were experts in the ether who described ways to define it, along with its various characteristics. It was thought, for example, that the ether didn’t move in any direction, but it could vibrate. There was much discussion about an ether wind. And then Einstein came along and described the nature of light without resorting at all to the ether.
Criticism of the mental disorder construct began at the very beginning of American psychology when William James declared that it was nothing more than superficial medical talk. Criticism continued throughout the 20th century, and when the latest version of the DSM came out, there was a ton of media and professional articles that once again pointed out its numerous scientific shortcomings. Many throughout general psychology expressed deep concerns that psychologists utilizing the DSM approach had sold out to psychiatry and the pharmaceutical industry. Moreover, they bitterly complained that a paradigm that utilizes the mental disorder construct brings down respect for psychology as a legitimate branch of science. What can be done about this?
Well, in thinking about this I hasten to mention that Thomas Kuhn’s (1972) classic book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, rightly points out, for real change to occur in a branch of science, it is not enough to point out the weaknesses of a paradigm, there needs, as well, a new approach that is a distinct improvement over the old paradigm. So, is it possible to really come up with a distinct improvement over the current DSM approach? I think our APA can do this easily if it set its mind to it, and it can do so within a year.