biological explanations of schizophrenia Flashcards
2 explanations ?
- dopamine hypothesis
- structural abnormalities
how was the link between dopamine and SZ established ?
Parkinson’s disease sufferers have low levels of dopamine and take the drug L-dopa to increase these levels reducing Parkinson’s symptoms
- however patients suffered SZ type symptoms as a result
what is dopamine?
a neurotransmitter that causes neurons to fire
what was the original dopamine hypothesis?
states SZ suffered from excessive dopamine that caused neurons to fire too often and transmit too many messages, high dopamine leads to positive symptoms
why is the original hypothesis claimed to be too simple/basic?
as they discovered several subtypes of dopamine receptor sites D1-D5 which were widely distributed in the cerebral cortex in the limbic system
why was the D2 receptor of interest ?
as it showed the impact of antipsychotic drugs and became the main focus of the dopamine hypothesis
function of the limbic system?
emotions and memory
2 main pathways of the limbic system?
- mesolimbic pathway
- mesocortical pathway
evaluation of dopamine hypothesis ?
research evidence - supported by evidence of psychoactive drugs such as cocaine which produce similar to SZ behaviour. Additionally Parkinson’s disease sufferers take L-dape to increase low levels of dopamine which sometimes causes SZ symptoms. all this evidence suggests that dopamine levels are involved in the positive symptoms of schizophrenia