Interactionist approach to schizophrenia

Question 1

strength of the interactionist approach

Answer 1

1. support for vulnerability and trigger
   - in a large scale study the impact of genetic vulnerability and dysfunctional parenting was investigated
   - followed 19,000 Finnish children whose mothers had been diagnosed with schizophrenia
   - compared to a control group of adoptees without a family history of schizophrenia
   - parents assessed for child rearing style
   - found that high levels of criticism, hostility and low levels of empathy were strongly associated with the development of schizophrenia but only in the high genetic risk group
2. real world application
   - combination of biological (drug treatment) and psychological treatments
   - Tarrier et al (2004) randomly allocated 315 participants to
   1 medication and CBT
3. counselling
4. control group (medication only)
   - participants in the combination groups showed lower symptoms following the trial than the medication only group
   - but no difference in hospital readmission
   HOWEVER - this is the treatment - causation fallacy so we cannot automatically assume the success of combined therapies meant the interactionist explanations are correct

Question 2

limitations of the stress model

Answer 2

1. diathesis and stress are complex
   - original method that portrayed diathesis as a single schizo gene and portrayed stress as schizophrenic parenting is too simplistic
   - multiple genes in multiple combinations influence diathesis
   - stress also comes in many forms including dysfunctional parenting
   - diathesis can be influenced by psychological factors and stress can be biological and psychological
   - study (2008) showed that sexual abuse in childhood was a major influence in underlying vulnerability to schizophrenia and cannabis is a major trigger
   - multiple factors (biological and psychological) affecting both diathesis and stress

Question 4

treatment according to the interactionist model

Answer 4

• acknowledges both biological and psychological factors
• combines anti psychotic medication and psychological treatments (CBT)
• more commonly used in the UK than USA

Question 5

modern understanding of stress

Answer 5

• anything that risk triggering schizophrenia
• old model stress was seen as psychological in nature
• cannabis is a stressor as it increases the risk of schizophrenia by 7 times