The research behind
The research behind the theories
The idea of sociotherapy was first presented in the autumn of 2021 and the spring of 2022 at the Swedish Sociological Association's conference at Uppsala University, in the Medical Sociology working group, with arguments for sociotherapy as a research program. This was followed up at the 2024 conference at the University of Gothenburg, again in the Medical Sociology working group.
At the same conference, Aristotelian Balance Theory (ABT) was presented as a proposal for a grand theory in the Sociological Theory working group. ABT was presented in the book Mediokersamhället och Aristotelisk balansteori (Berglund, 2026) and is used in the theory book to build the framework for sociological diagnoses and sociotherapy.
The theory book also surveys the fields adjacent to a research program around sociotherapy: clinical sociology, psychosocial studies, social work with sociological foundations, health sociology and medical sociology, mad studies and critical psychiatry, social psychiatry and social medicine, special education, critical psychology, and sociologists' analyses and criticism of psychology, psychotherapy, and psychiatry.