Abstract
Objective:
The aim of this article is to review the basic tenets of developmental psychopathology. Different scientific disciplines have to work together to understand the process of mental development. This article aims to summarize the ways of synthesising data from different research areas.
Methods:
Developmental psychopathology is a term that was first introduced by Rutter in 1970’s as a way of looking at developmental processes.This approach which has a biological basis looks at development in a systems theory perspective and considers both normal and abnormal developmental processess as a whole. The aim is to examine the components of devlopmental processess in a genetic and enviroment interaction context. This approach stressess the need to understand the protective and risk factors together. It examines the relations between child and adult psychopathology and looks for both continuities and discontinuities in terms of psychopathology. Rutter’s articles and conference notes that he summarizes developmental psychopathology approach form the basics of this article.
Conclusion:
Understanding the basics of developmental psychopathology approach will help the child and adolescent psychiatrists to acquire a multidimensional perspective . This kind of approach will also be helpful to provide us with a framework about how to handle childrens’s problems in therapy.
Keywords: developmental psychopathology, mental development
