Enativismo e as contribuições para os modelos de mente em psiquiatria

Abstract

This study examines the mind–body problem in psychiatry through the framework of enactivism, focusing on its application to the understanding of anxiety. It situates the philosophical dimension of the problem within the disciplinary gap between psychological and biological levels, proposing enactivism as an integrative approach that bridges psychopathology and neuroscience. The traditional biomedical model, shaped by physicalist reductionism and brain-centered explanations, is critically assessed for its neglect of contextual and interactive dimensions of psychiatric phenomena. In contrast, non-reductive physicalism is explored, distinguishing descending and ascending explanatory strategies, with the latter being more consistent with clinical practice. Within this context, enactivism advances an emergentist account in which anxiety arises from the dynamic interplay of brain, body, and environment, shifting the central explanatory concept from “threat” to “control.” This reconceptualization defines anxiety as the affective emergence of the need for control and offers psychiatry a more coherent and productive theoretical framework than the prevailing scientific paradigm.