psychological explanations

Question 1

Family dysfunction theories

Answer 1

Schizophrenogenic mother
Double bind theory
Expressed emotion

Question 2

What is Fromm-Reichmann’s theory?

Answer 2

Many patients had a schizophrenogenic mother
Cold rejecting and controlling
Creates family climate of tension and secrecy
Leads to distrust which develops into paranoid delusions

Question 3

What is Bateson’s theory?

Answer 3

Emphasised role of communication
Child receives mixed messages about what they are doing wrong
Unable to comment on unfairness
Punished with withdrawal of love
Left with confusing understanding of world, leads to disorganised thinking
Double bind is just a risk factor not main cause

Question 4

What elements does expressed emotion contain?

Answer 4

Verbal criticism of patient
Hostility including anger
Emotional over involvement in their life

Question 5

What is the expressed emotion theory?

Answer 5

Level of negative emotion expressed by carer to patient
Source of stress
Explains relapse
Can trigger it in people with genetic vulnerability

Question 6

What are cognitive explanations?

Answer 6

Focus on mental processes

SZ associated with abnormal info processing

Question 7

How is schizophrenia characterised by disruption to normal thought processing?

Answer 7

Reduced processing in VS = negative symptoms
Reduced processing in temporal and cingulate gyrus = hallucinations
Lower level of processing suggests cognition will be impaired

Question 8

What types of dysfunctional thought processing did Frith identify?

Answer 8

Metarepresentation

Central control

Question 9

What is dysfunctional thought processing?

Answer 9

Abnormal processing that produces undesirable consequences

Question 10

What is metarepresentation?

Answer 10

Cognitive ability to reflect on thoughts and behaviour, allows insight into goals and actions of others

Question 11

What is metarepresentation dysfunction?

Answer 11

Disrupts ability to recognise our actions as carried out by ourselves
Explains hallucinations of voices

Question 12

What is central control?

Answer 12

Ability to suppress automatic responses in favour of deliberate ones

Question 13

What is central control dysfunction?

Answer 13

Disorganised speech results from inability to suppress automatic thoughts

Question 14

Evaluation - support for family dysfunction as risk factor

Answer 14

Read reviewed studies of child abuse and SZ, 69% of adult women with SZ had history of abuse in childhood
Those with insecure attachments more likely to have SZ
However this was all carried out after symptom development so may be impaired

Question 15

Evaluation - weak evidence for family explanations

Answer 15

Assessing personality of mothers for crazy making characteristics - original approach
Blaming parents who have already suffered watching their child suffer

Question 16

Evaluation - strong evidence for dysfunctional information processing

Answer 16

Stirling - patients and controls did Stroop Test, named ink colours of colour words - suppress impulse to read words
Patients took twice as long to name colours
Gives us proximal causes (what causes current symptoms) but not distal causes (origins)

Question 17

Evaluation - evidence for biological factors not considered

Answer 17

Both bio and psych can produce symptoms - is this the same condition?
Diathesis stress model

Question 18

Evaluation - direction of causality

Answer 18

Are cognitive factors a cause or the result of neural correlates and abnormal NT levels