New approaches in childhood and adolescence psychiatry in XXI century Brazil: focus on prevention and risk control

Abstract

In this article, the emergence and dissemination of specialized knowledge in developmental psychiatry for childhood and adolescence in Brazil were discussed. A bibliographic and documentary investigation was carried out – in which I highlight an analysis of the reports (INPD, 2018, 2019) describing its researches and activities – and through which it was possible to observe that these new arrangements in psychiatry arise from of its approach to neurosciences in the last decades, and configure a theoretical model whose foundations are based on explanations about brain development. By establishing a research agenda with children and teenagers, recruited directly from some selected schools, specialists in developmental psychiatry aim to identify, at an earlier age, individuals at risk of developing mental disorders and, thus, create diagnostic and
therapeutic technologies that work in the scope of prevention. The analysis of the initiatives carried out by this group of psychiatrists – researchers at the University of São Paulo (UNIFESP),
Federal University of São Paulo (USP) and Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS) – over the past decade allows us to state that the legitimation and diffusion of this new psychiatry’s
paradigm in society contributes strongly to the expansion of the medicalization of childhood and
of the school space within the country