Integrating Evolutionary, Cultural, and Computational Psychiatry: A Multilevel Systemic Approach

TLDR

The evolutionary, cultural, and computational approaches frame mental disorders as multiscale entities and offer explanatory and modeling strategies for clinical practice, yet each is limited in addressing complex developmental trajectories and broader social systemic interactions. The study proposes to integrate evolutionary, cultural, and computational psychiatry into a multilevel systemic perspective, drawing on computational modeling from theoretical biology. The authors develop an Evolutionary, Cultural and Computational (ECC) model, integrating evolutionary, cultural, and computational explanations, and apply it to Major Depressive Disorder to illustrate its utility. Applying the ECC model to Major Depressive Disorder demonstrates how the integrative approach can guide research and clinical practice.

Abstract

This paper proposes an integrative perspective on evolutionary, cultural and computational approaches to psychiatry. These three approaches attempt to frame mental disorders as multiscale entities and offer modes of explanations and modeling strategies that can inform clinical practice. Although each of these perspectives involves systemic thinking, each is limited in its ability to address the complex developmental trajectories and larger social systemic interactions that lead to mental disorders. Inspired by computational modeling in theoretical biology, this paper aims to integrate the modes of explanation offered by evolutionary, cultural and computational psychiatry in a multilevel systemic perspective. We apply the resulting Evolutionary, Cultural and Computational (ECC) model to Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) to illustrate how this integrative approach can guide research and practice in psychiatry.