Lesson 6 - Holism vs Reductionism Flashcards
What is Biological Reductionism?
Biological reductionism refers to the way that biological psychologists try to reduce behaviour to a physical level and explain it in terms of neurons, neurotransmitters, hormones, brain structure, etc.
What is Environmental Reductionism?
Environmental reductionism is also known as stimulus-response reductionism. Behaviourists assume that all behaviour can be reduced to the simple building blocks of S-R (stimulus-response) associations and that complex behaviours are a series of S-R chains.
What is Holism?
Holism comes from the Greek word ‘holos’, which means ‘all’, ‘whole’, or ‘entire’ and is the idea that human behaviour should be viewed as a whole integrated experience, and not viewed as individual parts. Holism was founded in the 20s and 30s by a group known as Gestalt psychologists, and they declared that:
‘The whole is greater than the sum of it’s parts’.
What is Reductionism?
Reductionism is the belief that human behaviour can be explained by breaking it down into simpler component parts.
What are the Levels of Explanation?
There are 3 levels of explanation within reductionism, and they categorise the different parts that something is broken down into:
Highest level - the cultural and social explanations of how our social groups affect our behaviour.
Middle level - psychological explanations of behaviour
Lowest level - biological explanations of how genes, neuroanatomy, or biochemistry affects behaviour.
What is Parsimony?
Parsimony is the idea that complex phenomena should be explained in the simplest terms possible.
Evaluation of Reductionism - Reductionism can establish causality.
One strength of the reductionist explanation is that cause and effect can be established. This allows researchers to study many different factors, and decide which of them are the most important. This also makes psychology more scientific.
However, many reductionist studies are lab experiments often lack ecological validity. This means that the results are potentially not valid.
Evaluation of Reductionism - Reductionism can help identify mental illnesses.
Both biological and environmental reductionism can help with breaking down mental illnesses into constituent parts. This then means that these parts can be scientifically tested, and these do have practical application as they help people. SSRIs are found to be more effective than placebos at treating the symptoms of OCD, and this could only be found through reductionism.
Evaluation of Reductionism - Biological reductionism can lead to errors with drug prescription
Biological reductionism ignores the complexities of human behaviour. Conditions such as ADHD are often treated with drugs, as it is believed that this condition is caused by chemical imbalances. This then means that drugs are then prescribed to deal with this, however this can cause complications in children.
Evaluation of Reductionism - Reductionism utilises a large amount of animal studies.
A problem with environmental reductionism is that it relies too heavily on animal studies. For example, Pavlov’s studies are referenced highly, but this raises the issue, can humans be compared to rats and dogs. Humans have social contexts that influence behaviour, and other factors that are difficult to measure such as human cognition. This means that animal studies lack validity.
Evaluation of Holism - Group studies are essential
Many behaviours can only by analysed and understood when looking at a group of people, such as conformity or de-individuation. Reductionism focuses too heavily on the individual to do this, so this is where holism thrives.
Evaluation of Holism - A whole picture of human behaviour
The holistic explanation attempts to blend different levels of explanation, with the holistic theory, and attempts to provide a complete and realistic understanding of human behaviour.
Evaluation of Holism - Very difficult to test
Holistic approaches do not lend themselves to scientific testing. This means that they can become vague and overly complex. A prime example of this is the Humanistic Approach which takes the holistic view to behaviour, which is too difficult to test scientifically, and the approach is then criticised for being a loose set of concepts.
Evaluation of Holism - Lack of causation
Holistic explanations do not establish a cause and effect, because they do not examine behaviour in operationalised variables that can be measured and manipulated. This makes holistic explanations unscientific.
Evaluation of Holism - Multiple levels to a dilemma
Holistic explanations combine many different aspects into one, which makes a practical issue for researchers. This means that no one cause can be identified as they are seen as one issue, so there is no ‘correct’ treatment, as different overriding factors would need different treatment.
