dysfunctional thought processing as a psychological explanation

Question 1

what does the cognitive approach focus on within schizophrenia?

Answer 1

the role of mental processes and it suggests that schizophrenia is caused by disorganised and disordered thinking

Question 2

what did Frith (1992) identify?

Answer 2

identified two kinds of dysfunctional thought processing

Question 3

what does failure of central control suggest about schizophrenia?

Answer 3

schizophrenia is due to a faulty attention system. in schizophrenia, this cognitive ability to suppress automatic thoughts whilst we perform deliberate actions instead is faulty.

Question 4

what is our attention system?

Answer 4

when we filter out lots of information we are bombarded with, and only pay attention to a small amount

Question 5

what does the failure to filter information mean?

Answer 5

schizophrenics experience information overload, meaning they think all the information is important and they have problem focusing.

Question 6

what symptoms does failiure of central control explain?

Answer 6

the tangential and disorganised nature of thoughts and speech in schizophrenics, as well as the experience of hallusinations may be explained by this.

Question 7

what do the words trigger and what is a schizophrenics response?

Answer 7

every word said triggers associations, and the schizophrenic cant suppress the automatic response to these.

Question 8

what is metarepresentation?

Answer 8

metarepresentation is the cognitive ability to reflect on thoughts and behaviour, meaning we have our own insight into our own intentions and goals

Question 9

what is failure in metarepresentation?

Answer 9

dysfunction in our metarepresentation means we are unable to see our thoughts and actions as being carried out by ourselves- we process information differently to those without the disorder.

Question 10

what symptoms does failure in metarepresentation help to understand?

Answer 10

helps explain hallucinations and delusions such as thought insertion

Question 11

what part of the brain did Frith suggest cause abnormalities in our cognitive function?

Answer 11

suggested that these abnormalities in our cognitive processes are caused by abnormalities in the areas of the brain that use dopamine.

Question 12

AO3: how is ‘supporting evidence’ a strength to dysfunctional thought processing as a psychological explanation to schizophrenia?

Answer 12

Frith (1992) has found there tends to be less blood flow to dopamine using parts of the brain during cognitive tasks. this suggests that schizophrenics do indeed have deficits in their cognitive functioning and also links with biological explanations. However, this doesn’t directly suggest a supporting evidence for metarepresentation, so how can we truly know if someone’s thoughts are their own or not.

Question 13

AO3: how is ‘real life application’ a strength to dysfunctional thought processing as a psychological explanation to schizophrenia?

Answer 13

schizophrenics tend to use coping strategies that involve diverting these attention processes. this has led to the development of CBT for schizophrenia.

Question 14

AO3: how is ‘refuting evidence’ a limitation to dysfunctional thought processing as a psychological explanation to schizophrenia?

Answer 14

McKenna (1994) found schizophrenics were not easier to distract as we might expect if Friths explanations to central control were correct, than non-schizophrenics when completing a task that required focused attention

Question 15

AO3: how is ‘scientific status’ a limitation to dysfunctional thought processing as a psychological explanation to schizophrenia?

Answer 15

there are issues of cause and effect with this explanation. is it as Frith suggests, that dysfunctional thought processes cause schizophrenia? or is it that schizophrenia creates the changes in the cognitive abilities of an individual. this therefore means that the explanation lacks scientific status