Psychiatrists' education in psychology: jackdaw or sponge?

In his book The Organisation of Behaviour (1949), Donald Hebb remarked that: 'If some psychologists jibe at the physiologist for a bedfellow, many physiologists would agree with them heartily.' Much the same could be said of any proposed betrothal between psychologist and psychiatrist. Theirs has been an erratic and tempestuous relationship in which heated disputes and fervent antipathy have been punctuated by protestations of warmth, high regard, and good intention. Although a delicate peace has appeared to settle upon the relationship in recent years, as the two parties mellowed into a comfortable middle age, the terms of the relationship are constantly being re-negotiated: witness the recent British Psychological Society Royal College of Psychiatrists joint meeting, entitled 'Psychiatrists and psychologists: cooperation or confrontation?'. Central to a better understanding between the two parties is the need for improved education, both of psychiatrists in psychology and psychologists in psychiatry. The former was the topic of an earlier conference (AUTP, 1982), and is the concern of the present paper, but it should be emphasized that the latter (psychologists' education in psychiatry) also requires close scrutiny. Any discussion of psychiatrists' education in psychology needs to consider three aspects: first, psychology as science, purporting to stand in relation to psychiatry in much the same way that physiology does to medicine; secondly, psychology as technology, providing a set of techniques of use to clinicians; and, thirdly, psychology in relation to medical and psychiatric education in general, because the problems of teaching it are inseparable from the wider problems of medical education.