ABSTRACT
Introduction: objectivity and objectification If it is true, as we believe today, that the individual is not the automatic result ofhis genetic constitution but is, rather, the result ofhis development - that is, of his interaction with the environment in which he is born and grows up - then we must accept that individual psychopathology changes, as does the human individual, in accordance with the socio-cultural environment in which it is formed {Rangell 1975). In fact, the epidemiology of mental illness varies quantitatively and qualitatively from one society to another and in one and the same society in time, as that society gradually changes. However, the evaluation of these variations is very difficult, because it calls for an 'objective' description of the mental disorders presented to us, such that they can be catalogued and classified in a statistically usable form. In other words, it is necessary to invent statistical diagnostics.
