Biologism in psychiatry

Abstract

A recent study visit to North America impressed on me the seriousness with which Australian psychiatry should consider the recent ideological shift in the USA to an extreme biological model of mental disorders. There is increasing evidence that proponents of this model are not simply promoting the value of biological research (with which few psychiatrists would quibble), but that the field is at risk of being overwhelmed by a reductionistic "biologism" which assumes an organic causation for all abnormal human behaviour.