The DSM and the Resistant Reification Problem

I argue that there is only one way to interpret our current mental health diagnostic manuals: constitutively. I do so by showing that the only other way to interpret our manuals fails to meet the stated aims of the manuals themselves. Then I show that the constitutive position is the conceptual root of the reification problem by walking through the various attempts to provide validating mechanisms for existing diagnostic categories. In taking up this position, I argue that accounts that attempt to validate mental disorders using either biological or social mechanisms ultimately fail because they either also violate the aims of our diagnostic manuals or themselves fall prey to the reification problem. Furthermore, I show that the problem for validation—the problem of reification—persists in our best accounts precisely because we must take the constitutive interpretation of our diagnostic manuals.