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This article analyzes to what extent Darwin created a hermeneutics and how this hermeneutics guided Freud's epistemological position. For this purpose, it first moves away from a certain widespread conception, even among biologists, according to which Darwinism could be reduced to the idea of natural selection. Since most readers of psychoanalysis and psychopathology ignore this type of discussion, the article seeks to give special attention to it. Then, it shows how Freud inserts his contribution to science following that of Darwin. Both revealed -- each in his own way and with different purposes -- that a materialistic investigation of the psyche based on a naturalistic hermeneutic is possible. Finally, it resumes the critiques made by the philosophy of psychoanalysis to Habermas and Ricoeur's interpretations to highlight, with the help of aspects emphasized by Lacan, how the theoretical and clinical positions linked to such interpretations differ from Freud's proposals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the contributions of phenomenological psychopathology for the critical consideration of the phenomena of attention and inattention in the contemporary social and historical context. To achieve that goal, we analyzed the naturalist matrix of conception of attention and its dysfunction and situated phenomenological psychopathology. We present critical guidelines regarding the naturalistic conception of executive functions and their correlation with attentional processes and question descriptions of the inattentive subject's experience. We further analyzed the social normativity of the attentive experience and its intersubjective and contextual criteria. Finally, we propose a hermeneutical approach regarding contemporary attention regime, which highlights the link between the experience of attentive failure and the demands of a world that has become increasingly faster and filled with stimuli. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increased consumption of psychotropic drugs has been noted in Brazil and other Western countries in the last few decades for different reasons. The objective of this study was to understand the lived experience of individuals who used psychotropic drugs to cope with the problems faced in daily life. A qualitative study guided by hermeneutic phenomenology was carried out. In-depth interviews were conducted. The experience was grouped into two themes: experience of using psychotropic and the search for non-pharmacological approaches. Psychotropics were considered necessary for regaining a point of equilibrium when the problems faced were recognized as having a high degree of difficulty. In some cases, the drugs were perceived as insufficient for solving the problem, leading or not to the search for alternatives to deal with the difficulty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current Psychiatry is in crisis. Decades of neuroscientific research have not yet delivered adequate explanations or treatments. One reason for this failure may be the wrongness of its central assumption, namely that mental symptoms and disorders are natural kinds. The Cambridge School has proposed that a new Epistemology must be constructed for Psychiatry, and that this should start with the development of a new model of mental symptom-formation. 'Mental symptoms' should be considered as hermeneutic co-constructions occurring in a intersubjective space created by the dialogue between sufferer and healer. Subjective experiences (caused either by neurobiological or psychosocial upheaval) penetrate the awareness of sufferers causing perplexity and/or distress. To understand, handle and communicate these experiences, sufferers proceed to configure them by means of templates borrowed from their own culture. Importantly, however, the same neurobiological information can be configured into different symptoms; and different neurobiological information into the same symptom. Therefore, 'mental symptoms' are dissimilar hybrid combinations of neurobiological and cultural information. To be ethical, therapeutic interventions must take into account such dissimilarities. Blind manipulation of the brain in all cases should be considered as counterproductive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper describes a clinical experience at a hospital for custody and psychiatric treatment. After the suicide of one of his patients, the author faces the question about the supposed neutrality of the analyst in order to understand that he himself is in a process of mourning. The clinical question to be raised refers to the therapist s posture as being "affectable, " in opposition to some neutral and emotionally unmovable scientist. This aspect will be analyzed from Hans-Georg Gadamer's position of hermeneutics (1900-2002). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses an evaluation of Psychosocial Treatment Centers (CAPs) in the city of Campinas, State of São Paulo, Brazil, from the perspective of their users, through a narrative-hermeneutic study. It is seen that the CAPs are the only services with recognized therapeutic effectiveness in the lives of their users. The users report effective changes in their lives, especially in their relationships with their disorders and the construction of meanings of treatment. The participation of patients with severe mental illness in an evaluative study proved feasible, although it is still rarely used in Brazil. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]