DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of mental disorders)
in Abnormal, Clinical and Health Psychology
from Encyclopaedic Dictionary of Psychology
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The DSM is a manual outlining diagnostic criteria for psychiatric disorders, published by the American Psychiatric Association.
Currently in its fourth revision (DSM-IV; APA 1994), the manual is widely used to classify patients and select them for research on
particular disorders.
The first edition of the DSM was published in 1952, in response to the apparent lack of consensus among North American
psychiatrists about the criteria for various psychiatric disorders, which had become particularly evident during World War II (see s.
1, WAR AND PSYCHOLOGY). A draft manual was circulated among American Psychiatric Association members for approval and the final
version included a simple definition of each disorder, usually accompanied by a thumbnail sketch. DSM-II, published in 1968, was
designed to be consistent with the eighth edition of the World Health Organization’s INTERNATIONAL CLASSIFICATION OF DISEASE.
DSM-III, published in 1980 in response to continuing concerns about the RELIABILITY (see s. 6 and s. 8) of psychiatric diagnoses,
had an almost revolutionary impact on psychiatrists’ and psychologists’ attitudes towards psychiatric diagnosis. In order to
improve agreement between clinicians, each diagnosis was defined using a ‘Chinese menu’ system, in which precise
combinations of carefully defined symptoms were required for each disorder. By comparison, the revisions in the fourth edition
were not major, and the policy of including precise operational definitions has been maintained.
A competing diagnostic system, the International Classification of Disease (ICD) is published by the World Health Organization.
Critics of the DSM system point to the fact that, despite their apparent precision, the definitions continue to be agreed by
consensus, that patients often fulfil the criteria for multiple disorders (a phenomenon known as co-morbidity), that the number of
diagnoses has greatly increased in successive editions, and that evidence of the VALIDITY (see s. 6 and s. 8) of DSM diagnoses
remains largely absent (Bentall 2003).
American Psychiatric Association 1994: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders (4th edn). Washington, , DC:
APA.
Bentall, R. P. 2003. Madness Explained: Psychosis and Human Nature. London: Penguin.
Professor Richard Bentall
University of Manchester, UK
© 2006 Hodder Arnold
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APA
Bentall, R. (2006). DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of mental disorders). In G. Davey, Encyclopaedic dictionary of
psychology. Routledge. Credo Reference: https://ezproxyemc.flo.org/login?
url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/hodderdpsyc/dsm_diagnostic_and_statistical_manual_of_mental_disorders/0?
institutionId=1968
Chicago
Bentall, Richard. "DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of mental disorders)." In Encyclopaedic Dictionary of Psychology, by
Graham Davey. Routledge, 2006. https://ezproxyemc.flo.org/login?
url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/hodderdpsyc/dsm_diagnostic_and_statistical_manual_of_mental_disorders/0?
institutionId=1968
Harvard
Bentall, R. (2006). DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of mental disorders). In G. Davey, Encyclopaedic dictionary of
psychology. [Online]. London: Routledge. Available from: https://ezproxyemc.flo.org/login?
url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/hodderdpsyc/dsm_diagnostic_and_statistical_manual_of_mental_disorders/0?
institutionId=1968 [Accessed 3 May 2020].
MLA
Bentall, Richard. "DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of mental disorders)." Encyclopaedic Dictionary of Psychology, Graham
Davey, Routledge, 1st edition, 2006. Credo Reference, https://ezproxyemc.flo.org/login?
url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/hodderdpsyc/dsm_diagnostic_and_statistical_manual_of_mental_disorders/0?
institutionId=1968. Accessed 03 May 2020.
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