Holism And Reductionism Flashcards
What is the argument that people and behaviour should be studied as a whole system?
Gestalt psychologists claimed that ‘the whole is greater than the sum of its parts’. Breaking up behaviour and experience is inappropriate as these can only be understood by analysing the person or behaviour as a whole. This view is shared by humanistic psychologists who see successful therapy as bringing together all aspects of the whole person.
What is that behaviour should be broken down into constituent parts.
Reductionist approaches analyse behaviour by breaking down into smaller units. This is based on the scientific principal of parsimony - all phenomena should be explained using the most basic, lowest level and simplest principals (e.g. Behaviour of individual cells).
What are the levels of explanation?
These are different ways of viewing the same phenomena in psychology - some are more reductionist than others.
- Social-cultural level
- Psychological level
- Physical level
- Physiological level
- Neurochemical level
How do the level of explanation explain OCD?
- It involves behaviour most people would regard as odd (e.g. Repetitive hand-washing)
- The individuals experience of having obsessive thoughts
- The sequence of movements involved in washing ones hands
- Hypersensitivity of the basal ganglia
- Underproduction of serotonin.
How can psychology be replaced by a hierarchy of reductionism?
Can be placed in a hierarchy of science, with the more precise and ‘micro’ of these at the bottom (e.g. Physics) and the more general and ‘macro’ at the top (e.g. Sociology). Researchers who favour reductionist accounts of behaviour see psychology as ultimately being replaced by explanations derived from those sciences lower down in the hierarchy.
What is biological reductionism?
The physiological and neurochemical level. We are biological organisms made up of physiological structures and processes - all behaviour is at some level biological and can be explained through neurochemical, neurophysiological, evolutionary and genetic influences. This assumption has been successfully applied to the explanation and treatment of mental illness.
What is environmental reductionism?
The physical level, behaviourist stimulus-response links.
The behaviourist approach is built on environmental reductionism-behaviourists study observable behaviour and break complex learning up into simple stimulus-response links. So the key unit of this analysis occurs at the physical level - the behaviourist approach is not concerned with cognitive processes at the psychological level. The mind is regarded as a ‘black box’ - irrelevant to our understanding of our behaviour.
Strength of holistic - can explain key aspects of social behaviour.
There are some social behaviours that only emerge within a group context and cannot be understood at the level of individual group members. For example, the effects of de-individuation of prisoners and guards in the Stanford prison experiment could not be understood by studying the participants as individuals - it was the interactions between the people that mattered. This shows that holistic explanations are needed for a more complete understanding of behaviour than reductionist approaches.
Limitation of holism - it is impractical.
Holistic explanations tend to lend themselves to rigorous scientific testing and become vague and speculative as they become more complex. For example, if we accept there are many factors contributing to depression, it is difficult to establish which is most influential and which to use as a basis for therapy. This suggests that when it comes to finding solutions for real world problems lower level explanations may be more applicable.
Strength of reductionism - it’s scientific credibility.
A reductionist approach often forms the basis of scientific research. Target behaviours are reduced to constituent parts to create operationalised variables. This makes it possible to conduct experiments or record observations (behavioural categories) in meaningful and reliable ways. This gives psychology greater credibility, placing it on equal terms with the natural sciences lower down in the reductionist hierarchy.
Limitation of reductionism - the lack of validity.
Reductionist explanations at the level of genes or neurotransmitters oversimplify complex phenomena and so lose validity. They fail to analyse the social context of the behaviour - but this is where the behaviour derives its meaning. Physiological processes in pointing one’s finger are the same in any context. But an analysis of these processes does not tell us why the finger is pointed (e.g. To draw attention, as part of a raised hand to answer a question, or as an aggressive act). This means that reductionist explanations can never form part of an explanation.
Strength of both reductionism and holism - the interactionist approach.
Interactionist in the context of holism and reductionism considers how different levels of explanation combine and interact. For example, the diathesis-stress model explains mental disorders such as schizophrenia as the outcome of predisposition (often genetic) which is triggered by some stressor (often psychological). This model has led to a more multi-disciplinary and holistic approach to treatment (e.g. Combining drugs and family therapy) and is associated with lower relapse rates.
