Enactivism, the Regression of Medicalized Rhetoric and Transdiagnostic Treatment Approaches in Psychological Care

Unfortunately, our contemporary understanding of science has condemned psychology for being a ‘soft’ discipline. This perception, in part, is rooted in the historical challenges experienced by psychology as a field of study, where explanations for human behavior were frequently attributed to experiences of divine intervention and demonic possession. Consequently, to build a respectable reputation, psychology has had to overcompensate through developments of flawed transdiagnostic and biomedical treatment approaches that rely on medicalized rhetoric, limiting a client’s agency in treatment decisions, and baseline frameworks that operate under the inaccurate assumption of there being a normal and abnormal functioning human brain. However, through a unique integration of the physiological, experiential, sociocultural, and existential dimension, the methodology of enactivism serves as a representation for how future adaptations in psychological treatment can successfully possess the intricacies required to navigate the depth of complexity behind the human brain. Nevertheless, modern psychology along with its ‘mental’ health practices stands at a crucial junction today, begging the question: will psychology reset its narrative or continue optimizing the industry it has created?