Relational Mind: The Mistakes of Diagnosis and Internalism

This guest post by James Barnes Psychoanalytic diagnosis defense Mark L. Ruffalo.

The “relational” approach may be the original form of relational Psychoanalysis Or, it is a late “relational turn” that traverses other psychotherapy, and is based on core assumptions. Psychiatry The model has been envisioned for a long time. The general view that mental life is internal, individual, and self-contained, or what we might call the “atomic” concept of mind fundamentally shaped by interpersonal dynamics and subjective experiences, giving way to an embedded understanding of the mind.

This represents a “paradigm shift” that is often referred to as “one person” as the psychology of “two people.” A model rooted in Descartes’ dualism and its modern heirs imagines the mind as a private, surrounded system that separates its mind from others and the outside world. this philosophy As the basis of FreudIt is an original psychological model that continues to support mainstream psychiatric and clinical psychological models. The two models emerged from the confluence of object relational theories (e.g., Fairbain, Winnicott, and Barint), Attachments Research and existential phenomenological thought. It decisively rejects the Cartesian myth of isolated individuals, claiming that the mind is fundamentally open and interwoven into the structure of human relationships and social experience.

“The psychology of two” and “relational model” are relatively modern terms, but their roots can be traced back to the work of Freud’s colleague Helle, Sandor Ferenzi. From the beginning, it had an uneasy relationship with the psychiatric status quo. This has been thoroughly invested in diagnosing “individual mental disorders” for its medical foundation.

I argue that I am not only a philosophically outdated person, philosophically outdated, but also an empirically distrustful view not only as a widely accepted view in the social sciences outside of psychiatry and psychology. We now know that infants do not come to this world as private and self-involved beings, as others such as Descartes, then Freud, and later Piaget, have assumed and constructed their model. Research on young children over the past 50 years has ultimately shown that we are interpersonally open, sensitive, and adapted to other major environments from birth. Neuroscience This is backed up. The limbic and prefrontal cortex, important in our emotional and psychological lives, emerge over time through attachment experiences with caregivers and rely on functioning in appropriate interpersonal relationships. In other words, science shows that we are not simply a related, lonely mind. We are fundamentally relationships.

This raises fundamental problems in the models of individual “mental disorders” and subsequent diagnosis. Such a diagnosis is, by definition, limited to experience. Inside Individual – to internal mental or physiological states, or to actions arising from such states. DSMfor example, describes mental disorders as “personal dysfunction.” This is not a scientific conclusion, but an externally imported premise. From the perspective of the two, this is fundamentally false as the experience in question expands beyond the individual and incorporates aspects of the world, both of which are others and individual. “Disability” should still include these as there are only those involved, such as middle-stakeholders, family, and social relationships. This is essential.

Their transition to psychology involves the transition from the “biopsychosocial” model to what is called the “sociopropsychobio” model. The Sociopsychobio model begins with relational and social experiences and understands psychological and biological functions within its context, rather than expanding from individual functions and extending outside. In the case of dysfunction, or “being diagnosed,” is not primarily an interpersonal dynamic and/or failure of the system, which causes harm and distress. This continues directly from the perspective of the mind as a private, closed system understood to be fundamentally open and relevant in nature. Another paradigm cannot be explained by rehearsing beliefs and assumptions of the existing (one person) paradigm.

This is, of course, not to deny that people have internal experiences or related biological processes. Diagnosing social relational processes as internal states and treating them individually means that things have returned to the forefront. It is perfectly effective to talk about internal conditions, dysfunction, disorders, or pathology. Biology In a person, it is a “category error” when applied to mental life, opening up and incorporating other people and the outside world.

For example, consider the experience of depression. In a standard one-person account, this is a failure that arises from certain neurochemical or brain circuit dysfunction. Cognitionor maladaptive internal emotional processes. When people say they feel unworthy, “valuelessness” is likely caused by external circumstances, but ultimately presumed to be within the individual. In contrast, in two accounts, “valuelessness” is not an internal state Relational event. The person feels that it is worthless in terms of how they look Others saw, treated or ignored. Important others, such as families, partners, peers, bosses, and more, are directly and inevitably involved in the broader social structure, values, and expectations. Even if it started in the past, it is played with and by others in the present, and within such dynamics, a cure is found because it is where the problem is.

Misrepresenting relationship issues within an individual is not a theoretical error; ethics One. By denialing the constitutive role of others and the world, psychiatric diagnosis effectively quarantines individuals and places the burden of dysfunction within them. This not only obscures the true nature of psychological and mental distress, but also turns individuals into scapegoats due to broader relational and social failures. So, that is why such a diagnosis causes serious problems, from a relational perspective, they do more harm than good. They don’t just reflect the one-person paradigm. They breed it many times and keep it settled. And from a relationship perspective, this happens at a great cost.

James Burns, Massachusetts MSC. is a private practice psychotherapist and a faculty and lecturer at Iron Mill College, Exeter. He can be found on X @PsychGegeist52 or on his website JamesBarnes52.co.uk.