Bebbington P
Br J Psychiatry. 1980 Apr;136:317-25. doi: 10.1192/bjp.136.4.317.
The paper examines the nature of causality and how the concept can be interpreted and used in epidemiological psychiatry. The relationship of causality to logical relations is reiterated, and it is emphasized that these relationships in their pure form cannot apply to any one cause of an effect which is the outcome of several causes. In such a case the relation of the cause to the effect is one of weak implication. The fact of weak implication opens the door to the construction of certain causal models, and the possibilities afforded by this situation are illustrated by reference to the work of Brown et al (1975). Weak implication may be an intransitive relationship, and this is shown to invalidate certain ways of testing such models and the conclusions which arise from them.
本文探讨了因果关系的本质，以及该概念在流行病学精神病学中如何进行解释和应用。文中重申了因果关系与逻辑关系的联系，并强调这些纯粹形式的关系并不适用于作为多种原因结果的任何一个效应的原因。在这种情况下，原因与效应的关系是一种弱蕴含关系。弱蕴含这一事实为构建某些因果模型打开了大门，并通过引用布朗等人（1975年）的研究来说明这种情况所提供的可能性。弱蕴含可能是一种非传递性关系，这表明某些检验此类模型的方法以及由此得出的结论是无效的。
