Am J Psychiatry 1986; 143:1213-1221
Copyright © 1986 by American Psychiatric Association
Systems and the structuring of meaning: contributions to a biopsychosocial medicine
MA Schwartz and OP Wiggins
The authors discuss the biopsychosocial (systems) model of medicine
formulated by George L. Engel. The interaction among systems is explained
in terms of selection, negation, and the reduction of the complexity of
events. In psychosocial systems, vast possibilities of experience and
behavior are selected and negated through structures of meaning. The
authors illustrate how meaning organizes the experience and activity of a
man suffering a myocardial infarction, a case originally discussed by
Engel. The role of meaning in psychosocial systems leads to a discussion of
the scientific method for investigating it that is provided by Karl
Jaspers' psychology of understanding.
