Formulation and the Scientific Method

Abstract

To understand and explain our experiences, and to plan services, we need to do a little more than simply make a list of those problems. This means developing co-produced ‘formulations’. It is via these formulations that we can recognise the fact that psychosocial factors such as poverty, unemployment and trauma are the most well-established causes of psychological distress. It is, equally through such multidisciplinary formulations that we can acknowledge how other factors—for example, genetic and developmental—may influence the way in which each of us reacts to challenges. And it should be these formulations that form the basis for intervention.