Topic 14: psychosocial approaches to treatment

Question 1

Give psychological factors for medical treatment

Answer 1

• Provision of info
• Communication skills
• Quality of therapist-patient interaction

Question 2

Explain the placebo effect

Answer 2

• Any medicine has placebo component due to expectations of patients
• Even in serious diseases research shows more than 1/3 have relief after placebo tablet
• Many pain-killers have significant placebo
• However placebo has side-effects too

Question 3

Describe Stanley Schachter’s 2 factor theory of emotion

Answer 3

• Emotion has:
  1) Physiological arousal
  2) Cognitive label
• Emotion comes from mental awareness of body’s physical arousal

Question 4

Explain Schachter + Singer’s study on cues in environment to explain physiological changes

Answer 4

• There were 3 hypotheses:
  1) When a person feels physiological arousal BUT don’t know why = interpret feelings based on context/situation
• E.g. aroused in room of happy people = label feeling as happiness
  2) When person feels physiological arousal + have clear explanation = link arousal to that cause + not interpret in terms of environment
• E.g. had caffeine = heart racing due to that = don’t connect with external stimuli
  3) Past experiences + associations influence emotion = emotions only triggered if physiological arousal
• E.g. if in a situation of typical fear person will only feel fear if in already heightened state

Question 5

Explain the Suproxin study

Answer 5

• Participants told = injected with Suproxin drug to test eyesight
• However actually injected = epinephrine = increase heart rate/bp/respiration OR placebo
• Found 4 conditions:
  1) Epinephrine informed = told about side effects = expected to use cues given to explain physiological changes
  2) Epinephrine ignorant = symptoms not explained = expected to use any available cues explain changes
  3) Epinephrine misinformed = told wrong side effects that feet go numb + itchy = expected to use those cues for changes
  4) Control group = given placebo + not told any side effects = not experiencing any physiological change + no emotional label
• After injection confederate acting euphoric/angry interacted with participants = experimenter observed + state rated on scale = then given questionnaire + heart rate checked
• Euphoria = misinformed> ignorant> placebo> informed
• Anger = same
• Results show participants with no explain were more susceptible to confederate = support hypothesis by Schachter + Singer

Question 6

Factors influencing placebo response psychosocially

Answer 6

1) Variability in response: effectiveness depends on individual circumstances + context
2) Expectation + context:
- if believes strongly in effectiveness increases chance of benefit
- medicine looks more professional or administered in formal setting = increases belief in efficacy
3) Doctors role: effects stronger with doctor shows authority + confidence + enthusiasm + belief in treatment = patient picks cues and enhances response
4) Wonder drug phenomenon: new med introduced and made to seem amazing = initially seems effective due to heightened expectations = placebo like effect = overtime excitement wanes so effectiveness declines
- E.g. Prozac + Seroxat

Question 7

What are the psychosocial approaches to treatment?

Answer 7

• Psychoanalytic
• Humanistic
• Behaviourism
• Cognitive