The role of models in the medical explanation of socially maladaptive behavior.
Medical explanations of socially maladaptive behaviors most often involve an appeal to neuro-physiological models. One consequence of the appeal to such models is a lack of attention to the social character of the behaviors. It is, I argue, the social character of the behaviors that, even accepting a neuro-physiological etiology, makes classification and, hence, explanation of these disorders controversial and suspect. At the heart of the problem is the difficulty, resulting from the social aspects of the disorder, in fulfilling the logical conditions of the analogical arguments employed in the explanations. The theoretical points of the paper are illustrated by a discussion of hyperactivity.
D006801:Humans; D006948:Hyperkinesis / Q000145:classification / Q000209:etiology; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D010686:Philosophy, Medical; D012920:Social Behavior Disorders / Q000209:etiology