Journal
PERSPECTIVES ON PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE
Volume 12, Issue 6, Pages 999-1020Publisher
SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD
DOI: 10.1177/1745691617705892
Keywords
clinical psychology; dynamic systems; mental disorders; networks; personalized medicine; psychiatry; reproducibility
Categories
Funding
- European Research Council (ERC) [647209]
- Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) [451-14-002]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Since the introduction of mental disorders as networks of causally interacting symptoms, this novel framework has received considerable attention. The past years have resulted in over 40 scientific publications and numerous conference symposia and workshops. Now is an excellent moment to take stock of the network approach: What are its most fundamental challenges, and what are potential ways forward in addressing them? After a brief conceptual introduction, we first discuss challenges to network theory: (1) What is the validity of the network approach beyond some commonly investigated disorders such as major depression? (2) How do we best define psychopathological networks and their constituent elements? And (3) how can we gain a better understanding of the causal nature and real-life underpinnings of associations among symptoms? Next, after a short technical introduction to network modeling, we discuss challenges to network methodology: (4) heterogeneity of samples studied with network analytic models, and (5) a lurking replicability crisis in this strongly data-driven and exploratory field. Addressing these challenges may propel the network approach from its adolescence into adulthood and promises advances in understanding psychopathology both at the nomothetic and idiographic level.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available