A Social Constructivist Perspective on the Potential Relevance of Selected DSM‐5 Disorders for South African Children and Youth |
| |
Authors: | Susan Kriegler |
| |
Institution: | Department of Educational Psychology, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa |
| |
Abstract: | In South Africa, careless implementation of child psychiatry's biomedical model of ‘mental disorder’ could stigmatise children and youth who have been made vulnerable by the lingering effects of apartheid — poverty and malnutrition, violence and abuse, and the HIV/AIDS pandemic. A focus on DSM‐5 category changes — regarding post‐traumatic stress disorder and ADHD — demonstrates that these psychiatric labels are impracticable and irrelevant in a post‐colonial developing country, where mental health care is delivered in the context of scarce services and unequal access. A social constructivist perspective enables us to broaden policy decisions and suggest directions for research. |
| |
Keywords: | child psychiatry DSM‐5 HIV/AIDS mental health poverty social constructivism South Africa stigmatisation violence |
|
|