Psychological explanations of schizophrenia Flashcards
what are the two psychological explanations of schizophrenia
family dysfunction and cognitive
what is the double-bind theory
Bateson et al (1972) emphasised how the role of communication style within a family which can develop schizophrenia
the developing child regularly finds themselves trapped in situations where they are doing the wrong thing, but receive contradictory messages about this and feel unable to seek clarification
this leaves the child understanding the world as confusing and dangerous which is reflected in symptoms like disorganised thinking and paranoid delusions
what is expressed emotion
the level of emotion, particularly negative, expressed towards a person with schizophrenia by their family members
this can be:
- verbal criticism
- hostility, including anger and rejection
- emotional overinvolvement
these high levels of EE are a serious source of stress and can trigger the onset of schizophrenia or relapse
what is the schizophrenogenic mother
Frieda Fromm-Reichmann (1948) proposed a psychodynamic explanation for schizophrenia based on the accounts she heard from patients childhood
many patients spoke about a particular type of parent, whom she called the schizophrenogenic mother
labelled as cold, rejecting and controlling
tend to create a family climate characterised by tension and secrecy
leads to distrust and later develops into paranoid delusions
how is high predictive validity shown (strength)
through the ability to predict relapse rate of people with schizophrenia from EE measure
this means rates can be decreased because action can be taken to prevent relapse
psychiatrists can advise family against showing schizophrenogenic traits and displaying EE
why is there poor evidence base for the family explanations (limitation)
there is almost no evidence to support the importance of traditional family-based theories such as the schizophrenogenic mother and double bind
these theories are based on clinical observation and informal assessments of their mothers’ personalities, not systematic evidence
what are the problems with parent blaming (discussion)
research in the link between family and schizophrenia may be useful as it would show how childhood trauma can affect vulnerability to schizophrenia
however it is highly socially sensitive to do so because it can lead to parent blaming, for parents who have to watch their child suffer from this condition and then be told it is their fault adds insult to injury
what is dysfunctional thought processing
the disruption to normal thought processing, which schizophrenia is characterised by
Frith (1992) identifies two types of dysfunctional thought processing:
- metarepresentation dysfunction
- central control dysfunction
what is metarepresentation dysfunction
to metarepresent is the cognitive ability to reflect on thoughts and behaviour
this allows us insight into our own intentions and goals and the ability to interpret actions of others
dysfunction in this would disrupt our ability to recognise our own actions and thoughts as being carried out by ourselves
this explains hallucinations and hearing voices
what is central control dysfunction
central control is the cognitive ability to suppress automatic responses while we perform deliberate actions
speech poverty and thought disorder could result from the inability to supress automatic thoughts and speech triggered by other thoughts
for example, people with schizophrenia tend to experience derailment because each word triggers associations and they cannot supress their automatic response to these
what research support is there for cognitive explanations (strength)
Stirling et al (2006) compared performance on a range of cognitive tasks in 30 people with schizophrenia and a control group of 30 without
tasks included the stroop task, people with schizophrenia find this significantly harder and take over twice as long to complete
this shows how cognitive processes for people with schizophrenia are impaired
why is the cognitive explanation proximal (limitation)
it only explains what is happening to produce the symptoms, distinct from distal explanations which focus on what initially caused the condition
this means cognitive theories on their own only provide partial explanations for schizophrenia
