Psychological explanations for schizophrenia needs finishing

Question 1

family dysfunction definition

Answer 1

refers to the process within a family such as a poor family communication, cold parenting and high level of expressed emotion. these may be risk factors for both development and maintenance of schizophrenia

Question 2

cognitive explanations definition

Answer 2

explanations that focus on mental processes such as thinking, language and attention

Question 3

dysfunctional thought processing definition

Answer 3

informations processing that does not represent reality accurately and produces undesirable consequences

Question 4

what are the 3 parts of family dysfunction

Answer 4

-schizophrenogenic mother
-double-bind theory
-expressed emotion

Question 5

who proposed the schizophrenogenic mother

Answer 5

Fromm-Reichamnn

Question 6

how did the schizophrenogenic mother get proposed

Answer 6

psychodynamic explanation based on accounts from patients childhoods, as many spoke of particular type of parents

Question 7

what is the schizophrenogenic mother

Answer 7

cold, rejecting and controlling and tends to create family climate characterised by tension and secrecy

Question 8

what does the schizophrenogenic mother cause later in life

Answer 8

distrust that later develops into paranoid delusions and ultimately schizophrenia

Question 9

who founded double-bind theory

Answer 9

Bateson et al

Question 10

what is the double-bind theory based on

Answer 10

communication style within the family

Question 11

what causes double-bind theory

Answer 11

the developing child regularly finds themselves trapped in situation where they fear doing wrong, but receive mixed messages about what this is, and feel unable to comment on unfairness of situation or seek clarification

Question 12

what happens in a double-bind when the child gets something wrong

Answer 12

punished by withdrawal of love.

Question 13

what does double-bind leave the child with

Answer 13

understanding the world as confusing and dangerous, which is reflected in symptoms such as disorganised thinking and paranoid delusions

Question 14

what does Bateson think about double-bind as a causation for schizophrenia

Answer 14

clear that the main type of communication in the family of someone with schizophrenia not the only factor in developing schizophrenia, just a risk factor

Question 15

what is expressed emotion

Answer 15

level of emotion, in particular negative emotion, expressed towards a person with schizophrenia by their carers who are often family members

Question 16

what are the several elements of expressed emotions

Answer 16

-verbal criticism of the person, occasionally accompanied by violence
-hostility towards the person, including anger and rejection
-emotional overinvolvement in the life of the person, including needless self-sacrifice

Question 17

what does expressed emotions cause

Answer 17

serious source of stress for them. this is primarily an explanation for relapse in people with schizophrenia

Question 18

what else could the stress that triggers schizophrenia be caused by instead of expressed emotion

Answer 18

stress can trigger onset in person already vulnerable such as genetic makeup in the diathesis-stress model

Question 19

strength of family dysfunction as a psychological explanation of schizophrenia - research support

Answer 19

-evidence linking family dysfunction to schizophrenia
-indicators of family dysfunction include insecure attachment and exposure to childhood trauma, especially abuse. according to Read et al’s review with adults with schizophrenia are disproportionally likely to have an insecure attachment, particularly C or D. Read et al also reported 69% of women and 59% of men with schizophrenia have a history of physical and sexual abuse. In Morkved et al study most adults with schizophrenia reported at least one childhood trauma, mostly abuse –> strongly suggests that family dysfunction make people more vulnerable to schizophrenia

Question 20

limitation of family dysfunction as a psychological explanation of schizophrenia - explanations lack support

Answer 20

-poor evidence base for any explanations
-lots of evidence supporting idea that childhood family-based stress is associated with adult schizophrenia, there is almost none to support importance of traditional family-based theories such as schizophrenogenic mother and double bind. both these theories are based in clinical observation of people with schizophrenia and also informal assessment of their mothers’ personalities, but not systematic evidence –> emans family expectations have not been able to account for the link between childhood trauma and schizophrenia

Question 21

evaluation of family dysfunction as a psychological explanation of schizophrenia - parent-balaming

Answer 21

-although early explanations of the family-schizophrenia link have no research support, research in this area may be useful in showing that insecure and experience of childhood trauma affect individual vulnerability to schizophrenia
-on the other hand, research linking family dysfunction to schizophrenia is highly socially sensitive base it can lead to parent blaming. mothers seem to be particularly blamed. for parents already having to watch their child experience symptoms of schizophrenia and take responsibility for their care, to be blamed literally adds insult to injury

Question 22

cognitive explanations - what are the 3

Answer 22

-dysfunctional thinking
-metarepresentation dysfunction
-central control dysfunction

Question 23

cognitive explanations - focuses on

Answer 23

role of mental processes

Question 24

cognitive explanations - how is dysfunctional thinking causing schizophrenia

Answer 24

characterised by disruption to normal thought processing. this can be seen in many of the symptoms

Question 25

cognitive explanations - dysfunctional thinking examples of reduced thought processing in areas of the brain

Answer 25

-reduced thought processing in the ventral striatum is associated with negative symptoms -reduced processing information in the temporal and cingulate gyri is associated with hallucinations -this lower than usual level of information processing suggests that cognition is likely to the impaired

Question 26

cognitive explanations - metarepresentation dysfunction. who identified 2 kinds of dysfunctional thought processes

Answer 26

Frith et al

Question 27

cognitive explanations - what were the 2 dysfunctional processes Frith et al suggested

Answer 27

-metarepresentation -issues in cognitive ability to supressed automatic responses while we perform deliberate actions

Question 28

cognitive explanations - metarepresentation dysfunction. what is metarepresentation

Answer 28

cognitive ability to reflect on thoughts and behaviour. this allows us insights into our own intentions and goals. also allows is to interpret actions of others

Question 29

cognitive explanations - metarepresentation dysfunction

Answer 29

would disrupt ability to recognise our own actions and thoughts as being carries out by ourselves rather than someone else.

Question 30

cognitive explanations - what does metarepresentation dysfunction cause

Answer 30

explains hallucinations of hearing voices and delusions like thought insertion

Question 31

cognitive explanations - central control dysfunction what did Frith identify as issues with cognitive abilities

Answer 31

identified issues in cognitive ability to supress automatic responses while we perform deliberate actions. speech poverty and thought disorder could result form the inability to supress automatic thoughts and speech triggered by other thoughts

Question 32

cognitive explanations - problems in central control dysfunction explains

Answer 32

people with schizophrenia tend to experience derailment of thoughts because each word triggers associations, and the person cannot suppress automatic responses to these

Question 33

strength of cognitive explanations as a psychological explanation for schizophrenia - research support

Answer 33

-evidence for dysfunctional thought processing -Stirling et al compared performance on a range of cognitive tasks in 30 people without schizophrenia. tasks included stroop task in which participants have to name to the font colour of colour words, so have to suppress the tendency to read words aloud. as predicted by Frith et al's central control theory, people with schizophrenia took longer at over twice as long on average to name the font colours --> means cognitive processes of people with schizophrenia are impaired

Question 34

limitation of cognitive explanations as a psychological explanation for schizophrenia - proximal explanation

Answer 34

-only explains the proximal origins of symptoms -cognitive explanations are proximal as they only explain what is happening now to produce symptoms, which is distinct from distal explanations which focus initially on what caused the condition. possible distal explanations include genetic and family dysfunction explanations, what is currently unclear ad not well addressed is how genetic variations or childhood trauma might lead to problems with metarepresentation or central control --> cognitive theories only provide a partial explanation

Question 35

evaluation of cognitive explanations as a psychological explanation for schizophrenia - psychological or biological

Answer 35

-cognitive explanation provides an excellent explanation for the symptoms of schizophrenia. there is therefore an argument for seeing schizophrenia primarily as as a psychological condition -however, it appears that the abnormal cognition associated with schizophrenia is partly genetic in origin and result of abnormal brain development, suggesting it is a biological condition