Social psychiatry

Social psychiatry is a branch of psychiatry that focuses on the interpersonal and cultural context of mental disorder and mental wellbeing. It involves a sometimes disparate set of theories and approaches, with work stretching from epidemiological survey research on the one hand, to an indistinct boundary with individual or group psychotherapy on the other.

Social psychiatry combines medical training and perspective with fields such as social anthropology, social psychology, cultural psychiatry, sociology and other disciplines relating to mental distress and disorders. It has been particularly associated with the development of therapeutic communities, and with highlighting the effect of socioeconomic factors on mental illness. Social psychiatry can be contrasted with biopsychiatry, with the latter focused on genetics, brain neurochemistry and medication. Social psychiatry was the dominant form of psychiatry for periods of the 20th century, but is currently less visible than biopsychiatry.

After reviewing the history and activities of social psychiatry, Vincenzo Di Nicola reviews three major questions for social psychiatry and concludes with a manifesto for a 21st-century social psychiatry:

1. What is social about psychiatry? This addresses definitional problems that arise, such as binary thinking, and the need for a common language.
2. What are the theory and practice of social psychiatry? Issues include social psychiatry's core principles, values, and operational criteria; the social determinants of health and the Global Mental Health (GMH) Movement; and the need for translational research. This part of the review establishes the minimal criteria for a coherent theory of social psychiatry and the view of persons that emerges from such a theory, the social self.
3. Why the time has come for a manifesto for social psychiatry. This manifesto outlines the parameters for a theory of social psychiatry, based on both the social self and the social determinants of health, to offer an inclusive social definition of health, concluding with a call for action.^[1]