DSM Symposium Program

On the paraphilias, including pedophilia, from a psychiatric perspective.

DSM categories of mental disorder are confounded with “vice” concepts because diagnostic criteria in many categories describe wrongful or criminal conduct. I provide an analysis of this issue and describe a nosological procedure for managing this problem using the DSM pedophilias as key examples.

President, Association for the Advancement of Philosophy and Psychiatry

Hearing and listening are not the same thing and this presentation argues that genuine listening must occur in order for the DSM-V to be scientifically and ethically accurate with respect to minor-attracted persons. Genuine listening requires two types of “virtues” in the transaction: communicative virtue in the hearers and testimonial virtues in speakers.

Igor I. Galynker, M.D., Ph.D.
Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Beth Israel Medical Center, Albert Einstein College of Medicine
New York, NY

At present, the DSM definition of pedophilia is highly rudimentary, consistent with significant limitations in our scientific knowledge about sexual attraction to prepubescent children. The purpose of this talk is twofold: 1) to present data from a research program studying the psychological correlates of pedophilia and 2) to consider future research directions in order to separate the factors contributing to the existence of pedophilic desire from the factors contributing to the acting on such desires. Elucidation of such factors should support the development of more precise and clinically meaningful diagnostic systems.

Medical Director, Institute for Sexual Wellness, Quincy, MA

This presentation will focus on the DSM-V changes to the diagnosis of pedophilia. The theoretical foundation and scientific evidence for the inclusion of the diagnosis of Pedohebephila will be reviewed. The legal, ethical, and medical consequences from the creation of Pedohebephilia will be discussed.

The medicalization of social deviance–and especially sexual deviance–far too easily blurs the boundary between the helping professions and the criminal justice system, creating the potential (often realized) for psychiatry to become a means of controlling undesirables, rather than an agent of healing. In this presentation, I focus on the diagnosis of pedo(hebe)philia, asking whether it could be reformed so as to promote the well-being of patients and potential patients; I argue that it cannot.

This presentation will challenge normative assumptions about sexuality, personal and political identity, and childhood, both within the DSM and within wider society, framing the upcoming changes through a theory of queer phenomenology and sexual alignment.

An analysis of ways in which the DSM has contributed to the stigmatization of people who are attracted to minors (MAPs) will be presented. Data from surveys of MAPs in the general population will be used to demonstrate the effects of this stigmatization on the willingness of MAPs to seek mental health services when needed.