In 1980, psychiatric practitioners and educators were surveyed to
determine their concepts of the knowledge and skills that define a
specialist in psychiatry. The authors repeated this survey, expanding the
list of skill and knowledge items and asking respondents to comment on
whether particular skills or knowledge were important to a psychiatric
subspecialty. Less importance was ascribed in the current survey than in
the earlier survey to certain long-term and social psychotherapies, and
more importance was ascribed to descriptive or biological psychiatry; brief
or supportive therapies; psychopharmacological agents; consultation-liaison
psychiatry; evaluation of children, the aged, and alcoholics; and certain
desirable personal characteristics of the psychiatrist.
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