The new fourth revision of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) published by the American Psychiatric Association may define several new psychiatric disorders. Some of these do not sound like varieties of mental illness at all, but rather opinions and attitudes. What would “oppositional defiant disorder,” for example, represent?
Proposed changes to the U.S. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) could include reclassifying childhood temper tantrums, teenage angst, and binge eating as psychiatric disorders. If accepted, the proposals could equal billions of dollars in new revenue for pharmaceutical companies.
Adderall and Adderall XR, schedule II controlled substances composed of amphetamine and dextroamphetamine, have several Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved uses. However, both prescribed and recreational use of these drugs, especially among young people, is associated with serious, life-threatening side effects.
Two Jews may, as the saying goes, have three opinions, but that appears to be a fairly modest ratio when compared with psychiatrists. It was inevitable that revisions to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders would invite controversy—it’s the classic reference work for mental-health professionals, and a convenient field guide to understanding crazy exes for the rest of us—but even the American Psychiatric Association, which first appointed the work groups to update the text two years ago, couldn’t have predicted the squabbles now under way.
DSM5 first went wrong because of excessive ambition; then stayed wrong because of its disorganized methods and its lack of caution. Its excessive and elusive ambition was to aim at a “paradigm shift”. Work groups were instructed to think creatively, that everything was on the table. Accordingly, and not surprisingly, they came up with numerous pet suggestions that had in common a wide expansion of the diagnostic system – stretching the ever elastic concept of mental disorder. Their combined suggestions would redefine tens of millions of people who previously were considered normal and hundreds of thousands who were previously considered criminal or delinquent.