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29 - Psychiatric Classification: An A-reductionist Perspective

from Section 10

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 April 2020

By
Jan-Willem Romeijn  and
Hanna M. van Loo
Edited by
Kenneth S. Kendler ,
Josef Parnas  and
Peter Zachar
Kenneth S. Kendler
Affiliation:
Virginia Commonwealth University
Josef Parnas
Affiliation:
University of Copenhagen
Peter Zachar
Affiliation:
Auburn University, Montgomery
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Summary

This paper develops the idea that nosological reform is ultimately a matter of finding homogeneous groups of patients that are maximally distinct from each other. The focus lies on the statistical properties of patients, so that the problem of classification coincides with the problem of the reference class from the philosophy of science. It is argued that specific statistical methods – model selection and causal modeling – can assist in finding good classifications. An important advantage of these statistical methods is that they do not favor any particular explanatory level or vocabulary. Whether or not we should include some patient characteristic in our classification scheme is an empirical issue, to be settled entirely by its contribution to the performance of the scheme in predictions and intervention decisions. For this reason the paper adopts a so-called a-reductionist perspective: we do not need a principled discussion on reductionism.

Keywords

classificationreference class problemmodel selectioncausal modelingreductionism
Type
Chapter
Information
Levels of Analysis in Psychopathology
Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives
 , pp. 349 - 370
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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