What’s in a Named Illness? The Overstated Role of Mental Disorders in Patient Insight

The conceptualization of patient insight in psychiatry has been criticized for its lack of clarity. A standard view about insight is that it encompasses three components: patient recognition of their symptoms, attribution of such symptoms to a mental disorder, and recognition of need for treatment. This paper challenges the necessity of the second criterion for establishing insight and questions whether the three criteria alone are sufficient to establish insight. I then present an alternative to the second criterion framed in terms of adequate explanations for psychiatric symptoms. This alternative criterion seeks to offer a nuanced understanding of patient insight beyond the conventional framework.