3. Non-biological treatment of Schizophrenia

Question 1

Systematic desensitisation (3 things)

Answer 1

• If behaviours are learnt they can be unlearnt.
• Systematic desensitisation is used to replace faulty association between CS and CR that has resulted in a phobic response.
• The aim is to replace the fear response to an object, situation or activity and replace it with the feeling of relaxation- sometimes referred to as counterconditioning

Question 2

Systematic desensitisation Stages

Answer 2

1) Reasons and reactions - First they discuss reasons for the phobia and reactions caused.

2) Deep muscle relaxation - teach patients how to relax their muscles. These may include self-hypnosis, breathing exercises or progressive muscle relaxation.

3) Fear/anxiety hierarchy - creating hierarchy of situations/objects the patient fears- least to most feared.

4) Imaging whilst relaxing - Working through the hierarchy but starting with imagining each stage and trying to stay relaxed.

If patient cannot feel relaxed, they move back to an earlier stage.

Question 3

Systematic desensitisation evaluation - strengths (2)

Answer 3

It’s effective
McGrath et al found that 75% of patients with phobias responded well to systematic desensitisation and had an improvement in symptoms.
This suggests that if unlearning these anxiety disorders seems to be effective in treating the symptoms, it is likely to be that they have been learnt in the first place.

It is a quicker treatment than other psychological therapies.
Psychoanalysis can take a very long time to access the actual cause of the phobia and start to deal with it. However, this can encourage patients to begin to relax in the presence of their phobia instantly.
Therefore whilst this therapy may only be palliative, it may be useful as it can have a more instant effect in dealing with the symptoms than other psychological therapies.

Question 4

Systematic desensitisation evaluation - weakness

Answer 4

Only focuses on treating the symptoms and not the underlying cause.
SD is a treatment suggested by the behaviourist explanation and it teaches people to be able to be calm in the presence of a feared object but it doesn’t deal with why it’s there in the first place. The reason why they have phobias is not treated.
Therefore the behavioural therapies (especially SD) are palliative as they only deal with the symptoms and not the cause.

Question 5

Outline a non-biological treatment of one specific disorder (5 marks)

Answer 5

One Non-biological treatment would be systematic desensitisation. This is when an individual will learn a new behaviour through counter-conditioning (learning a new association). Firstly the therapist and patient will complete an analysis as (if the person has a fear of spiders) they would figure out how the person got a fear of spiders and which situations make them fearful. There would then be a construction of an anxiety hierarchy with the patient ordering their fear from the least to the most fearful (on a scale of 1-10). For example seeing a picture of a spider might be a 2, whereas holding a spider might be a 10. The patient will be taught relaxation techniques such as regulating breathing. After this the patient is gradually exposed to their phobia, first seeing the least fearful thing on the anxiety hierarchy. The patient will see the picture of the spider, be taught to relax and once they show no anxiety they move on to the next thing. This process is repeated until the patient experiences the most frightening thing of all (holding the spider) without feeling fear.