Epistemic disadvantage and therapeutic asymmetry in psychiatric care.

Abstract

In a recent commentary, Alcalay argues that the concept of epistemic disadvantage provides a useful framework for understanding forms of epistemic harm that may arise even in the absence of epistemic injustice. We agree that this concept identifies an important category of harms associated with warranted asymmetries of expertise and offers valuable insights into both clinical and nosological practices. However, we suggest that, in some clinical situations, clinicians may intentionally maintain interpretative distance from a patient's explicit narrative while fully recognizing its sincerity, meaning, and experiential value. We argue that psychiatric care frequently involves what we call therapeutic asymmetry, i.e., situations in which interpretative distance forms part of the therapeutic process itself. Using examples based on suicidality, loyalty conflicts, mania and AI sycophancy, we aim to show that clinicians may sometimes refrain from accepting patient narratives at face value because suffering can affect capacities for self-understanding, self-deliberation and decision-making. Therapeutic asymmetry highlights the role of alterity, interpretation, and clinical judgment in situations where patients seek assistance precisely because they struggle to understand, interpret, or transform aspects of their own experience.