Whose account matters? A challenge to feminist psychologists

Abstract

Most critiques and commentaries concerning the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) focus on the expanding scope of the system, on particular categories of disorder, or on unwarranted claims about the biological bases of symptoms embedded in DSM descriptions. In contrast, this essay focuses on phenomenology, the subjective experiences of those supposedly being categorized by this whole framework. In addition to allowing us to see extreme states and unusual perceptions, thoughts, actions, and feelings with fresh eyes – from the perspective of the distressed person’s own categories and explanations – a phenomenological approach forces us to confront important ethical and political issues often ignored in discussions of diagnosis and treatment. Feminist psychologists in particular need to think more deeply about these issues, to avoid taking untenable moral positions and violating core assumptions about the right to define one’s own experience.