Alternative Perspectives on Psychiatric Validation : Dsm, Icd, Rdoc, and Beyond

Many of the current debates about validity in psychiatry and psychology are predicated on the unexpected failure to validate commonly used diagnostic categories. The recognition of this failure has resulted in, what Thomas Kuhn calls, a period of extraordinary science in which validation problems are given increased weight, alternatives are proposed, methodologies are debated, and philosophical and historical analyses are seen as more relevant than usual.

In this important new book in the IPPP series, a group of leading thinkers in psychiatry, psychology, and philosophy offer alternative perspectives that address both the scientific and clinical aspects of psychiatric validation, emphasizing throughout their philosophical and historical considerations.

This is a book that all psychiatrists, as well as philosophers with an interest in psychiatry, will find thought provoking and valuable.

Peter Zachar, Professor of Psychology, Auburn University Montgomery, USA,Drozdstoj St. Stoyanov, Full Professor, Department of Psychiatry and Medical Psychology, Faculty of Medicine, Medical University of Plovdiv,Massimiliano Aragona, Professor of General Psychology, Faculty of Philosophy and School of Psychiatry, La Sapienza University, Rome, Italy,Assen Jablensky, Winthrop Professor of Psychiatry, University of Western Australia, Australia

Peter Zachar graduated from Loras College in Dubuque, Iowa with degrees in philosophy and psychology. After doing volunteer work in the inner city of Chicago, he returned to graduate school and completed a Ph.D. in psychology at Southern Illinois University. He worked for two years as an agency psychologist in a rural community mental health center before obtaining an academic position at Auburn University Montgomery in 1995. Promoted to Full Professor in 2005, he served eight years as Chair of the Department of Psychology from 2003 to 2011. His primary area of scholarship is philosophical issues in psychiatric classification. Zachar has authored two books - Psychological Concepts and Biological Psychiatry - A Philosophical Analysis (John Benjamins, 2000) and A Metaphysics of Psychopathology (MIT Press, 2014).


Drozdstoj (Drossi) Stoyanov was born on July, 20th 1980 in Sofia, Bulgaria. He graduated from the high school in 1996 and received his MD from the Medical University of Sofia in 2002. He presented a PhD thesis in the field of theory and methodology of neuroscience in 2005; certified in December 2007 by the Government Specialty Board with the rank of Psychiatrist and awarded Postgraduate Certificate in Philosophy of Mental Health from the University of Central Lancashire, United Kingdom in October 2010.
Dr Stoyanov was tenured as Associate Professor in the Medical University of Plovdiv in 2008 and hold the position of Vice Dean for International Affairs of its Faculty of Public Health from 2009 to 2011; since 2011 appointed in the Faculty of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry and Medical Psychology and Special Advisor Strategic Partnerships to the Vice Rector.


1994: University Degree in Medicine, Sapienza University, Rome (Italy)
1998: Post-graduate degree in Psychiatry, Sapienza University, Rome (Italy)
1999: Inscription in the list of Psychotherapists, Reggio Calabria (Italy)
2004: University Degree in Philosophy, Sapienza University, Rome (Italy)
Since 2000: Psychiatrist of the Italian National Health Service, since 2005 clinical and scientific director of the Day Hospitalization Service for Eating Disorders of the ASL RMD, Rome, Italy
Since 2004 Professor at the Faculty of Philosophy, Sapienza University, Rome (Italy)
Since 2012 Professor at the S. Andrea Hospital School of Psychiatry, Sapienza University, Rome (Italy)

Assen Jablensky, MD, is Winthrop Professor of Psychiatry at The University of Western Australia in Perth and Consultant Psychiatrist at Royal Perth Hospital. From 1975 to 1987, he held a senior position with the World Health Organization in Geneva, where he was Co-Principal Investigator of the influential WHO Ten-Country Study of Schizophrenia and one of the leading experts in the development of the ICD-10 classification of mental disorders. Currently he is a member of the WHO International Advisory Group for the revision of the ICD-10 classification of mental disorders. The main focus of his research is on psychiatric epidemiology, genetics, and classification of mental disorders. Prof Jablensky has over 350 publications, of which 172 are articles in peer-reviewed research journals.