2 psychological explanations of schizophrenia (AO1)

2 psychological explanations of schizophrenia (AO1)

1. Disturbed thinking

   • cognitive psychologists suggest that schizophrenia is caused by faulty thought processes
   • further suggest that these faulty thought processes are caused by abnormal brain functioning
   • in neurological pathway between the hippocampus and pre-frontal cortex - linked to faulty regulation of dopamine in this area

2. Frith - differences in conscious and pre-conscious thought

   • Frith (1992)- suggests that schizophrenics have problems filtering information between conscious and pre-conscious processing
   • conscious processing is used when we have to think and pay close attention to what we are doing
   • pre-conscious processing is for tasks which are more trivial that we can do automatically without thinking
   • and we can usually do a number of tasks at once

3. How delusions and hallucinations develop

   • because the filter between the 2 types of processing is defective in schizophrenia, allows unimportant information to reach their conscious awareness
   • this information is misinterpreted as important and is how delusions are explained
   • hallucinations are explained by unimportant non-speech based sounds filtering into conscious awareness and are experienced by schizophrenics as voices

4. Dysfunctional families and double-bind theory

   • other psychological explanations suggest that schizophrenia may result from dysfunctional family relationships
   • Bateson et al - proposed the double-bind theory which suggests that as children schizophrenics received contradictory messages from parents
   • a mother may tell the child she loves them while her body language is rejecting
   • makes the child confused as they do not know how to respond and as a result they fail to develop a coherent structure of reality
   • this in the long run causes the schizophrenic systems

5. Expressed emotions

   • family relationships theory also suggest that the type of communication within the family may influence relapse rates in schizophrenia
   • it is proposed that high levels of expressed emotion within the family influences relapse
     • a communication style that involves criticism, hostility and emotional over-involvement
   • some research has found that a patient returning to a family with high EE are 4 times more likely to relapse