Whereas people with "regular old depression" tend to be highly vulnerable to psychological stress, one way of thinking about bipolar disorder is that it is a condition of extreme sensitivity to the circles of time.

CNN: Can keeping a routine help control bipolar symptoms?

But in the case of anorexia, bulimia and, possibly, obsessive-compulsive disorder, Dr Fetissov's work opens a new line of thinking about how these diseases might be treated.

ECONOMIST: Psychiatric disorders and immunity

She threw in slight OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder) for good measure, to which I scoffed, thinking of the clothes strewn about my house.

CNN: SHARE THIS

For example, Frances said DSM-5 would mislabel one in four people with chronic pain and irritable bowel syndrome with the DSM-5's newly created "somatic symptom disorder, " which is diagnosed when a person has spent at least six months steadily thinking of and being anxious about their medical illness.

CNN: Are we over-diagnosing mental illness?