Factor Analysis and Psychopathology

Abstract

A major contributor to medical classification was the seventeenth-century British physician Thomas Sydenham, who promoted the concept of a syndrome. Sydenham argued that a careful observer of patients could note that certain sets of symptoms tended to co-occur. If these co-occurring sets of symptoms were seen repeatedly across a number of patients, this observance would suggest that the syndrome may represent more than a chance collection of symptoms. Instead, the consistent appearance of a syndrome would suggest a disease with a common etiology and a common treatment.

Knowledge comes from noticing resemblances and recurrences in the events that happen around us.

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