The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (the DSM) provides a c

Question

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (the DSM) provides a common language and standard criteria for the classification of mental disorders. It is used by clinicians, researchers, psychiatric drug regulation agencies, health insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, and policy makers. The newest edition, the DSM-5, was just released on May 18, 2013 and it is the first major revision to the DSM in nearly twenty years!

Research the new changes to the DSM, and post about one change that you personally think is notable, interesting, positive, negative, or just bizarre/curious (don't forget to include why you think so)! You must bring an original thought to the discussion,--or if you explore a change that has already been discussed, please credit that classmate and explore a different rationale for why that change was positive, negative, interesting, etc.

Explanation / Answer

Among the many changes made from the DSM-IV-TR to the DSM-5, the one that I found most positive was the move from the term “mental retardation” in the DSM-IV-TR to the term “intellectual disability” in the DSM-5. The term intellectual disability has been more commonly employed due to the shift of how clinicians are now visualising deficits in intelligence due to adaptive functioning and not just an individual’s IQ score. In the DSM-V the severity of intellectual disability is rated by levels of adaptive functioning and not IQ, which was previously the case in DSM-IV-TR.

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