Objective: to resuscitate the old clinical category of 'disorder of the will'.
Method: a detailed conceptual study is presented of the origins and history of
the will as a mental function, and of its disorders as they were first described
during the nineteenth century. An account is also offered of the historical
changes that led to the decline of the will, and to the dispersion of important
clinical phenomena such as aboulia, obsession and impulsiveness which have
since not received satisfactory causal explanation. Results: historical analysis
shows that the decline and fall of the will was due not to any major piece of
empirical work demonstrating that the concept was unsound but to general
changes in philosophical fashion, and to the temporary influence of the anti
mentalistic tenets of behaviourism and the anti-volitional assumptions of
psychoanalysis. Conclusion: clinical disorders like aboulia, impulsiveness and
obsessions seem to share conceptual features which nineteenth century
psychiatrists managed to capture very well in their clinical category of disorder of
the will. Current accounts, which include semi-explanatory concepts such as
'drive' , 'motivation' or frontal lobe 'executive', are not conceptually better
than the old notion of will nor are they superior as correlational variables for
neurobiological studies. It is suggested, therefore, that the will, updated
according to modern work in the philosophy of action, is re-adopted as a
research category in current psychiatry.
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