A Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology Can Transform Mental Health Research. (May 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Conway, Christopher C.; Forbes, Miriam K.; Forbush, Kelsie T.; Fried, Eiko I.; Hallquist, Michael N.; Kotov, Roman; Mullins-Sweatt, Stephanie N.; Shackman, Alexander J.; Skodol, Andrew E.; South, Susan C.; Sunderland, Matthew; Waszczuk, Monika A.; Zald, David H.; Afzali, Mohammad H.; Bornovalova, Marina A.; Carragher, Natacha; Docherty, Anna R.; Jonas, Katherine G.; Krueger, Robert F.; Patalay, Praveetha; Pincus, Aaron L.; Tackett, Jennifer L.; Reininghaus, Ulrich; Waldman, Irwin D.; Wright, Aidan G. C.; Zimmermann, Johannes; Bach, Bo; Bagby, R. Michael; Chmielewski, Michael; Cicero, David C.; Clark, Lee Anna; Dalgleish, Tim; DeYoung, Colin G.; Hopwood, Christopher J.; Ivanova, Masha Y.; Latzman, Robert D.; Patrick, Christopher J.; Ruggero, Camilo J.; Samuel, Douglas B.; Watson, David; Eaton, Nicholas R.;
• Is Part Of: Perspectives on psychological science. Volume 14:Number 3(2019)
• Page Start: 419
• Page End: 436
• Publication Date: 2019-05
• Subjects: mental illness -- nosology -- individual differences -- transdiagnostic -- Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology -- HiTOP -- ICD -- DSM -- RDoC; Psychology -- Periodicals; 150
• DOI: 10.1177/1745691618810696
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1745-6916

Abstract

For more than a century, research on psychopathology has focused on categorical diagnoses. Although this work has produced major discoveries, growing evidence points to the superiority of a dimensional approach to the science of mental illness. Here we outline one such dimensional system—the Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology (HiTOP)—that is based on empirical patterns of co-occurrence among psychological symptoms. We highlight key ways in which this framework can advance mental-health research, and we provide some heuristics for using HiTOP to test theories of psychopathology. We then review emerging evidence that supports the value of a hierarchical, dimensional model of mental illness across diverse research areas in psychological science. These new data suggest that the HiTOP system has the potential to accelerate and improve research on mental-health problems as well as efforts to more effectively assess, prevent, and treat mental illness.