David Tolin: Pseudoscience in Mental Health Treatments

A Stockholm Psychiatry Lecture given at Nobel Forum, Karolinska Institutet May 28 2013 by Dr David Tolin, Director, The Institute of Living and Adjunct Associate Professor at Yale University. Dr Tolin is well known for his research on OCD and Hoarding and has was the host of the TV series “The OCD project”. Dr. Tolin discusses the contribution of scientific and pseudoscientific theories and methods to mental health treatment. Characteristics of mental health pseudoscience will be described, with several real-life examples. He discusses ways to distinguish scientific from pseudoscientific practices, and provides guidelines for clinicians, consumers, and regulators that will help insure that mental health treatment is based on the best scientific evidence available.