The New Paradigm of Occupation Flashcards
What is a paradigm?
A paradigm represents a shared set of beliefs, knowledge, and vision that guide a scientific discipline.
- When an existing paradigm fails to account for current problems and observations, a new one must be created.
What happened regarding occupation in the 20th century?
In the 20th century, the term occupation was nearly replaced by the term purposeful activity.
Occupation began its reappearance in the 1980s, coinciding with the Model of Human Occupation and the birth of occupational science.
Since then, the profession’s understanding of occupation has become more complex, influenced by epistemological transformation.
- Epistemology refers to the profession’s ways of knowing or how we know what we know.
What is an issue with occupation?
An issue with occupation is that there is not one accepted definition to describe the core concept of occupation.
Complexity theory provides a way of understanding and articulating the nature of the interactions between concepts so they can be seen as a whole, complex system.
- Some refer to occupation as a concept, while others use the term construct.
Systems Theory
This theory help us to understand how things interact
The biopsychosocial perspective represents one such attempt to move medical practice toward a more holistic and systems-oriented approach.
Who was Ludwig von Bertalanffy?
He opposed the idea of reductionism, focusing on the relations between the parts that connect into a whole rather than separate parts. This is known as the General Systems Theory.
- This theory includes the view of holism, reflecting the idea that entities can only be understood when regarded as a whole
What is one of the principles of the General Systems Theory?
Once of the principles of the General Systems Theory is that we can only understand the whole by regarding the links, interactions, and processes among the parts that make up the entire system.
- In OT, a direct example of how the Systems Theory could serve as a foundational framework for OT practice was published.
What happened regarding the launch of MOHO?
The launching of MOHO was the 1st attempt to promote a systems perspective for treatment by an OT.
Kielhofner stated that “the larger units of reality for OT under a systems framework are the human career, the special role, ecology, competency, and fitness for social participation.”
General Systems Theory: Core Concepts
Living organisms are influenced, exist, and maintained by:
- Input: information that enters a system
- Throughput: involves sensations, perceptions, thoughts, and internal analysis
- Output: involves ideas, behaviors, and reactions
- Feedback: from the environment about these behaviors, ideas, reactions, and their consequences for other parts of the system
Open system
Constant interchange of information, energies, and actions with environment
Constantly in motion and constantly changing - it’s dynamic
Regulated by positive and negative feedback
Significant open system principle - a change to one part of the system will automatically alter the whole
Often observed in family systems when one person is sick and the whole family is affected and experience a period of imbalance
General system defined
A whole that functions as a whole by virtue of the interaction of its parts.
An entity greater than the sum of its parts because it consists of:
1. parts
2. the way the parts act together
3. the qualities that emerge from these relationships
Anything physical, biological, psychological, sociological, or symbolic
An entity that can be static, mechanical, mechanically self-regulating, or organismically interactive with the environment
An entity with a hierarchy to organize its complexity
General systems theory intro in OT
In the 1980s, a hierarchal structure of organizing knowledge, research, and scholarly activity was introduced.
- person + environment + occupation = occupational performance (linear)
MOHO introduced 3 subsystems for human occupational behaviors: volitional, habituation, and performance, with volitional at the top.
As MOHO evolved, the subsystems were presented as a heterachy, meaning they worked together on the same level.
By the 21st century, research findings invalidated the structuralist views of systems due to the dynamic and complex nature of systems and unpredictability of outcomes.
- Pragmatism didn’t allow distinction between subjectivity and objectivity, and recognized the influences on each of the physical and mental aspects of humans, their artifacts, their environments, and the societies and times in which they live.
Complex systems theory
An outgrowth of general systems theory
- describes emergence, adaptation, and self-organization of systems
There is an interactive effect of the personal, occupational, and environmental variables that can’t be seen nor understood by isolating them.
The OT must first understand and analyze how these variables interactively led to chaotic behaviors by observing the whole process.
- Then they can begin to experiment with different arrangements of this pattern by altering sequences of the various components and modifying variable until healthy balance is restored
Systems dynamics
Involves the identification of multifaceted interrelationships among system components while recognizing that not all properties of the whole can be understood through analysis
EX: Social dynamics in families and communities and occupational performance within multiple and changing contexts are complex.
Chaos theory
Also known as butterfly effect
A related offshoot of systems theory that is defined as dynamic systems or interwoven forces and motions of nonlinear systems
Nonlinear dynamics
Self-organizing
Pattern forming
Sensitive to initial conditions
Dynamic and transactional
Highly subjective and situation dependent
Both occupation and development follow nonlinear paths. Biological organisms are systems that incorporate nonlinear dynamics, characterized by complexity, randomness, and nonlinearity.
