L5 - Holism and Reductionism Flashcards
what is reductionism?
reductionism involves breaking a COMPLEX PHENOMENON (like behaviour) down into CONSTITUENT ELEMENTS. Reductionism considers this process to be desirable because complex phenomenon are best understood in terms of a SIMPLE EXPLANATION.
what is the reductionist approach?
the REDUCTIONIST APPROACH in psychology suggests that explanation for a behaviour should BEGIN AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL and then progressively look at COMPONENT ELEMENTS:
highest level - cultural and social explanations of behaviours
middle level - psychological (beahvioural) explanations of behaviour
lowesst level - biological explanations of behaviour
what is ENVIRONMENTAL REDUCTIONISM?
environmental reductionism argues that behaviour can be reduced to a simple relationship between behavioura and events, the complex emotion of attachment is reduced to a set of probabilities - the mother is likely to provide food which is reinforcing, hence she is a rewarding individual and becomes a loved one
what is BIOLOGICAL REDUCTIONISM?
BIOLOGICAL REDUCTIONISM reduces human behaviour to the level of the action of neurons, neurotransmitters, hormones and so on. E.g it has been suggested that schizophrenia is caused by EXCESSIVE ACTIVITY of the NEUROTRANSMITTER DOPAMINE because drugs that BLOCK this neurotransmitter REDUCE SCHIZOPHRENIC SYMPTOMS.
what is HOLISM?
HOLISM focuses on systems as a WHOLE rather than on the constituent parts, and suggests that we cannot predict how the whole system will behave just from knowledge of the individual components.
what is HUMANISTIC HOLISM?
the humanistic approach believes that the individual reacts as an ORGANISED WHOLE rather than a set of stimulus response links. What matters is a person’s sense of a unified identity and thus a lack of identity or sense of wholeness leads to a mental disorder
what is COGNITIVE HOLISM?
the cognitive approach recognises the importance of understanding an entire system. Memory is a complex system which in recent years has been understood in terms of CONNECTED NETWORKS. Each NEURON is linked to many other NEURONS.
These links develop through experience and with each new experience the links are strenghthened or weakened. The network as a whole behaves differently than individual parts
+ SCIENTIFIC
both BIOLOGICAL REDUCTIONISM and ENVIORNMENTAL REDUCTIONISM are viewed as scientific. Breaking complex phenomenon into small constitutent parts means that they can be SCIENTIFICALLY TESTED and over time explanations of behaviour based on scientific evidence will emerge
+ BIOLOGICAL THERAPIES
biological reductionism has led to the development of biological therapies, such as drugs. E.g SSRIs are more ffective than placebos at treating the symptoms of OCD and REDUCE SYMPTOMS for up to 3 MONTHS after the treatment. The use of SSRIs in patients with OCD has helped to reduce the anxiety associated with OCD, providing relief for some patients.
- ERRORS OF UNDERSTANDING
some psychologists argue that BIOLOGICAL REDUCTIONISM CAN LEAD TO ERRORS OF UNDERSTANDING because its SIMPLISTIC and ignres the complex interaction of many factors in determining behaviour.
E.g If we treat conditions like ADHD with drugs thinking that the condition is nothing more than NEUROCHEMICAL IMBALANCES we are mistaking the symptoms of the condition for its cause. RITALIN may reduce these symptoms but it doesnt address the factors that caused the ADHD in the first place, so a purely biological understanding seems inadequate.
- ANIMAL STUDIES
much of the research supporting ENVIRONMENTAL REDUCTIONISM used ANIMAL STUDIES (PAVLOV AND SKINNER). Is human behaviour really a scaled up version of animal’s behaviour?
Critics of reductionism point to the SOCIAL CONTEXT in which humans are embedded from the earliest moments of life, and hard to measure factors like cognition, emotion, and intentionality. Here it also seems that the reductionist position is if not clearly incorrect, at least inadequate.
- WOLPE
ENVIRONMENTAL REDUCTIONISM can mean that the true meaning of a behaviour is OVERLOOKED.
WOLPE treated a woman who had a phobia of insects with SYSTEMATIC DESENSETISATION, but found NO IMPROVEMENT. It turned out that her HUSBAND, whom she was not getting along with, had an INSECT NICKNAME. Her phobia was not the result of CLASSICAL CONDITIONING but an EXPRESSION OF HER MARITAL DIFFICULTIES
