Psychological explanation to explaining schizo Flashcards
Define family disfunction
Abnormal processes within a family such as poor family communication, cold parenting and high levels of expressed emotion. These may be risk factors for both development and maintenance of schizophrenia
The three family dysfunction explanations
The schizophrenogenic mother
Double-Bind theory
expressed emotions
The schizophrenogenic mother
proposed by Fromm-Reichmann
She uses Psychodynamic explanation to explain the formation of schizo. It was due to a particular type of parents which she called the schizophrenogenic mother. This mother was cold, rejecting and controlling and tends to create a family climate characterised by tension and secrecy.
How does schizophrenogenic mothers cause schizophrenia
It leads to distrust that later develops into paranoid delusions (i.e. delusions of persecution) and ultimately schizophrenia
What is double bind theory
proposed by Bateson et al.
emphasises the role of communication style within a family. child is trapped in situations where they fear doing the wrong thing but receive mixed messages about the situation and does not seek clarification. So when they get it wrong the child is punished by withdrawal of love. This then causes them to see the world as confusing and dangerous and this is reflected by symptoms such as disorganised thinking and paranoid delusions.
However Bateson did make it clear and this does not cause schizophrenia but just increases the risk factor
Whats expressed emotion
Is the level of emotion (negative emotion) expressed towards a person with schizophrenia by their carers. It contains several elements
Elements of expressed emotion
1)Verbal criticisms of the person accompanied by violence
2)Hostility towards the person, including anger and rejection
3)emotional over-involvement in the life of the person, including needless self-sacrifice
Kuipers et al research on expressed emotion
Found that high EE relatives talk more and listen less. High levels of EE are most likely to influence relapse rate (increase in symptoms)
Lindzen et al on EE
A patient returning to a family with high EE is about 4 times ,ore likely to relapse than patient whose family is low in EE.
What do research on EE shows about it effects on schizophrenia
People with schizophrenia have a lower tolerance for intense emotional comments and interactions with family members. It appears that negative climate in these families leads to stress and thus triggering schizophrenic episodes. Noll found that family who is helpful, the person with schizophrenia reduces their dependence on antipsychotics and help reduce the likelihood of relapse
Cognitive explanations of Schizophrenia
Schizophrenia is related to several abnormal information processing . Frith et al identified two kinds of dysfunctional thought processing that could underlie some symptoms.
Two dysfunctional thought processing identified by Frith
Metarepresentation is the cognitive ability to reflect on thoughts and behaviour. Dysfunction in Metarepresentation would disrupt our ability to recognise our own actions and thoughts as being carried out by ourselves rather than someone else. Explains why people hallucinate and get delusions
Central control is the cognitive ability to suppress automatic responses while we perform deliberate actions instead. Disorganised speech and thought disorder could result from the inability to supress automatic thought and speech triggered by other thoughts. For example people with schizo tend to experience derailment of thoughts and spoken sentences because each word triggers associations, and the person cannot supress automatic responses to these
