The National Institute Of Mental Health

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In 2013, the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) broadly launched the Research Domain Criteria project (RDoC). The purpose of RDoC is to provide a working framework to advance dimensional approaches of classifying psychopathology on the basis of observable behaviors and neurobiological measures (National Institute of Mental Health, 2013). Reflecting on the last thirty years, incredible progress has been made in understanding brain-behavior relationships in numerous mental disorders. The continued interdisciplinary work of geneticists, cognitive and affective neuroscientists, and behavioral researchers has not only expanded our knowledge of biological causal and maintenance factors, but has also provided the field with a strong…show more content…
Within each of these broad domains the project details more specific constructs and subconstructs. For example, the construct effortful control is nested under the cognitive systems domain. Effortful control is then further elaborated into subconstructs such as goal selection, updating, and performance monitoring. Over the next few years, NIMH will be conducting a series of workshops focused on further refining the definition of the broad domains of functioning and respective dimensional constructs and subconstructs covered within each domain. Additionally, these workshop groups are tasked with organizing and disseminating gold standard measures or indicators of analyses for the previously mentioned areas of study (e.g., genes, neural circuitry, physiology). Performance on these variables will then be used to classify research participants in future studies. This approach would replace the current systems designated by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM–5; American Psychiatric Association, 2013) and the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD-10; WHO, 1992). In comparing the RDoC initiative to the DSM-5 and ICD-10 diagnostic approaches, RDoC is noticeably unique in three principal ways. The RDoC project and respective framework are envisioned as a dimensional system that spans in range from typical to atypical.
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