HYPOTHESIS AND THEORY article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology
Mapping Mental Life: The Dimensional Model as a Framework for Theory, Practice, and Research
Provisionally accepted
- Shalvata Mental Health Center, Hod HaSharon, Israel
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Contemporary psychotherapy lacks an integrative framework that systematically connects behavior, cognition, emotion, experience, and being. The Dimensional Model of the Psyche addresses this gap by conceptualizing mental life as unfolding through five nested psychological dimensions-action, thought, emotion, experience, and being-within a descriptive, meta-theoretical framework governed by five operational principles that regulate the transitions between them. The present article introduces the full theoretical formulation of the model, articulating its conceptual foundations and dynamic principles. Clinical illustrations demonstrate how the model clarifies therapeutic processes and guides intervention. The Dimensional Model articulates a structured psychological continuum composed of qualitatively distinct yet dynamically co-present dimensions, offering an organizing language that bridges theory, clinical practice, and research.
Keywords: clinical supervision, Dimensional model, Meta-framework, Psychological dimensions, Psychotherapy process
Received: 01 Nov 2025; Accepted: 13 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Mendlovic. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Shlomo Mendlovic
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