Psychiatry and psychotherapy: the science of sitting with uncertainty

Abstract

Objective: This perspective piece aims to delve into the challenges and possibilities arising from uncertainty in psychiatry and psychotherapy.

Method: This is a perspective piece.

Results: Historical considerations, polarised conceptual frameworks, interacting systems, limited randomised controlled research, and varying practice approaches, coalesce to form an exoskeleton of ambiguity and uncertainty in psychiatry and psychotherapy that seems almost impenetrable. Yet it is these very things that allow psychiatry to challenge accepted norms, avoid complacency, and shed its skin.

Conclusion: Ambiguity and uncertainty in the setting of partial knowledge presents psychiatry with a challenge, yes; but it also enables psychiatry to be innovative in its approach, and to address the complexities of the human condition in a way that is unique and unparalleled within the field of medicine.

Keywords: Psychiatry; Psychotherapy; Science; Uncertainty.