Jack has been diagnosed with schizophrenia.
He describes his family background to his therapist:
‘I could never talk to mum. She fussed over me all the time. I tried to do what she said, but could never please her. One minute she seemed all affectionate and the next minute she would make nasty comments. My dad hated all the arguments and stayed out of it.’
Describe the family dysfunction explanation for schizophrenia and explain how Jack’s experiences can be linked to the family dysfunction explanation (8 marks).
AO1
Possible content:
•Schizophrenia is due to family experiences of conflict, communication problems, criticism and control
•Double-bind communication (Bateson 72) – child receives mixed messages and cannot do the right thing – results in disorganised thinking and paranoia
•High expressed emotion where family shows exaggerated involvement, control, criticism which increases likelihood of relapse (Kavanagh 1992); relapse rate is doubled (Butzlaff and Hooley 1998)
•Psychodynamic theorists recognised a schizophrenogenic (schizophrenia-causing) mother – typically cold, controlling and rejecting which leads to excessive stress which triggers psychotic thinking; father in such families is often passive.
•Family schism and skew
Jack has been diagnosed with schizophrenia.
He describes his family background to his therapist:
‘I could never talk to mum. She fussed over me all the time. I tried to do what she said, but could never please her. One minute she seemed all affectionate and the next minute she would make nasty comments. My dad hated all the arguments and stayed out of it.’
Describe the family dysfunction explanation for schizophrenia and explain how Jack’s experiences can be linked to the family dysfunction explanation (8 marks).
AO2
Possible application:
•Several references to conflict (‘arguments’), communication problems (‘could never talk to mum’), criticism (‘nasty comments’) and control (‘tried to do what she said’)
•Jack experiences the double-bind (mother’s behaviour alternates between affection and nastiness) so Jack doesn’t know how she wants him to behave and becomes confused – loses touch with reality
•The family show high expressed emotion – over-fussy (‘she fussed over me..’) and critical (‘nasty comments’)
•Jack’s mother is cold and unpredictable, (schizophrenogenic characteristics) and father was passive (‘stayed out of it’).
•Symptoms of skewed family – father is uninvolved
