Are All Mental Disorders Affective Disorders?
Passion July 9, 2026 Michelle Maiese 6 citations
All mental disorders are fundamentally affective disorders, according to an argument that draws on enactivist philosophy and ecological psychology. Enactivism characterizes mental disorders as disordered sense-making, which is inherently affective. The affordance-based approach emphasizes that affectivity discloses action possibilities. Both sense-making and affordance perception rely on affectively driven selective attention. The argument is illustrated by showing that language disturbances in schizophrenia and context blindness in autism stem from disruptions to affectivity and selective attention, impairing engagement with relevant affordances.