non biogical explanation of schizophrenia Flashcards
What does the cognitive approach believe causes Schizophrenia
A disturbance in language, attention, thought and perception
What does the cogntiive approach say causes issues like hallucinations?
Sensory overload/inability to filter out irrelevant information from the senses
Some cognitive psychologists say that Dopamine is sufficient to explain some symptoms of Schizophrenia- where do other symptoms come from?
People attempting to make sense of these e.g. they hear whispering so ask soeone to confirm this, the other person denies it which leads to delusions and then disorganised thinking to make the delusion make sense
What did Frith suggest causes hallucinations?
thinking inner voice is an external voice
What did Frith suggest causes issues with delusions about others?
Delusions may be caused by an inability to process social situations appropriately (monitoring behaviour and intention of others), so leading to feelings of persecution
What did Helmsley suggest about Schizophrenia?
A poor link between memory and perception can lead to disorganised thinking as people will not know what to expect from a situation (this can then lead to things like social withdrawal)
What three processes did Frith say causes schizophrenia?
Inability to generate action, monitor their own actions and monitor the actions of others
What did McGuigan find about cognition and Schizophrenia?
immediately before episodes of auditory hallucination were reported, some schizophrenic patients showed activation of the vocal centres, which may suggest that they misinterpret their own inner voice as belonging to someone else
What did Sitskoom find about cognition and schizophrenia?
relatives of schizophrenics had similar cognitive deficits, but they did not develop schizophrenia, meaning that other factors must also be involved
What did Butler find about Schizophrenia and cognition?
there is less activity in the frontal lobes of those with schizophrenia, showing they are less likely to monitor information from the senses so disagreeing with the cognitive explanation
What did Frith & Done find about Schizophrenia and Cognition?
Asked participants to follow a target on a video game with a joystick. Both schizophrenics and non-schizophrenics could do this when they could see the errors they made on the screen, but when the errors were not visible, schizophrenics with delusions did a lot worse than the control group, suggesting that schizophrenics have difficulty monitoring their own actions
Why is this theory useful (and possibly therefore credible?)
The cognitive explanation has led to cognitive behavioural therapy for schizophrenics, which has some effectiveness suggesting the cause of schizophrenia is cognitive
What is an issue with CBT for Schizophrenia?
Cognitive behavioural therapy is less effective for symptoms such as lack of emotional expression, suggesting these symptoms may have another cause rather than cognitive.
Why would this theory be reductionist?
ignores the impact of social class and other environmental factors on the development of schizophrenia so may not fully explain the disorder
Why might this be seen as holistic?
focuses on both nature, in the form of neurotransmitters and nurture, so it is a more complete explanation than the biological explanation
