Browsing by Author "Iso-Kokkila, Eero"

Goals: The Categorical definition of mental health disorders has been proven problematic. The Scientific endeavour to understand mental health disorders from categorical point of view and to develop better treatment accordingly has not reached its goals despite decades of study. Transdiagnostic psychopathology and especially dimensional models have been suggested to overcome these problems. The researchers who have suggested dimensional models define mental health disorders as manifestations of relatively few core underlying psychological constructs. However critique has been presented that these dimensional models are too simplifying to capture the fluctuating and multifaceted nature of mental health disorders. Consequently another novel conceptualization, namely the network theory of mental health, has been suggested to overcome the problems of dimensional models. From the network point of view psychopathology does not constitute of underlying constructs but instead from the direct causal network of relations between the symptoms. Network methods offer a powerful tool to study multidirectional causal connections between the different facets of mental disorders. But again, network theories have been criticized of not taking into account the thoroughly argued problems of categorical definitions of mental health as most network studies have focused on researching symptoms listed in different diagnostic manuals under categorically defined mental disorders (etc. DSM). The aim of this study is to combine the most functional parts of these two novel fields of study and to attempt to perform a network analysis on a transdiagnostic clinical assessment questionnaire. CORE-5 is used for this purpose, as it is arguably such a questionnaire since it includes items that measure both psychiatric symptoms (anxiety and depression symptoms) but also items of positive mental health (social functioning, psychological functioning and subjective well-being). Methods: The study used a longitudinal and frequently gathered sample that consisted of psychiatric patients. The sample was gathered by assessing the patients who were at a intensive psychiatric day ward clinic in Järvenpää. The sample consisted of 32 patients of whom 59 % (19) were female. The weighted directed networks were formed by using the coefficients created with lagged multilevel regression analysis. The sample was divided between the persisters and remitters by utilizing GAF -questionnaires results. The patients whose scores reflected moderate symptoms or more severe were selected to a group of persisters. Divided like this, the remitters group had 15 patients (47 %). Results and conclusions: The results indicated, that CORE-5 questionnaire's items that measured positive mental health, were in a temporal interaction with the assessed psychiatric symptoms - depression and anxiety. Especially the item of subjective well-being had a central role in a network of mental health. A difference in the role of psychological functioning in the network was noticed between persisters and remitters. These observations support the view that not just psychiatric symptoms but also positive mental health - especially subjective well-being - has a noticable role in psychopathology. This study suggests that in the study of psychological networks, a step towards transdiagnostic point of view should be taken and start taking into account also other variables than psychiatric symptoms. Also this study suggested, that in the definitions of psychopathology in general, the role of positive mental health should be considered as more integral part of mental health disorders.