Schizophenia - Psychological Explanations Flashcards
What is the main theory in the psychological explanation?
Family dysfunction
What can Family Dysfunction be split into?
Family Relationships
Schizophrenogenic Mother
Double Blind Theory
Expressed Emotion
Explain family relationships
Factors such as:
poor family communication, cold parenting and high levels of EE
are 3 characteristics of a dysfunctional family
These can be seen as risk factors for both the development and maintenance of schizophrenia
Explain without detail the Schizophrenogenic Mother?
This is the Freudian idea that a cold, dominant and created conflict mother causes schizophrenia to emerge in the child
What would a schizophrenogenic Mother be like?
These mothers were said to be
- Rejecting
- Overprotective
- Self sacrificing
- Moralistic about sex
- Fearful of intimacy
Explain Fully the Schizophrenogenic Mother?
This is the Freudian idea that a cold, dominant and created conflict mother causes schizophrenia to emerge in the child
These mothers were said to be rejecting, overprotective, self sacrificing moralistic about sex and fearful of intimacy
So it was thought that the distrust, resentfulness and instability caused by a mother creates a family environment of tension and secrecy. Which leads to distrust that latter develops into Paranoia delusions leading to schizophrenia.
What was Bateson the first to do?
Look at the family dynamic of people with diagnosis of schizophrenia
What type of family dynamic did Bateson emphasis?
Communication styles
What are double blinds?
Contradictory messages
What is Double Blind Theory
According to Bateson the children who frequently receives contradictory messages (double blinds) from their parents are more likely to develop schizophrenia
According to the theory these interactions prevent the development of an internally coherent construction of reality, and in the long run, this manifests itself as symptoms of schizophrenia
What is EE?
Expressed Emotion - EE is a family communication style in which members of a family of a psychiatric patients talk about the patient in a critical or hostile manner or in a way that indicates emotional over involvement or over concern with the patient if the behaviour
What is different about EE?
This theory explains relapses in patients
But it could trigger the development of schizophrenia due to increased stress levels (in someone who is already vulnerable)
Explain the theory of EE?
The idea is that if there is a high degree of EE (that is to say there is a high negative emotional climate) due to the family variable of dysfunctionality that would increase the chances of relapse
High EE may involve:
Critical comments through tone and content occasionally accompanied by violence
Hostility towards the patient, including anger and rejection
Emotional, over-involvement in the life of the patient including needless self sacrifice
What may high EE involve?
High EE may involve:
Hostile tone
Hostile comments
Occasional violence
Anger
Rejection
Emotional, over-involvement in the life of the patient including needless self sacrifice
Explain the positive evaluation of family relations as a risk factor?
• Read et al. (2005) reviewed 46 studies of child abuse and schizophrenia and concluded that 69% of adult women with a diagnosis of schizophrenia had a history of physical abuse, sexual abuse or both, in childhood. And Men was -59%
• Berry et al. (2008) adults with insecure attachments
are more likely to have schizophrenia.
What is a big disadvantage in much of this research in schizophrenia?
Methodological issues
Explain the negative evaluation: Methodological issues
Information gather from sufferers can’t be trusted as they may have had memories distorted by delusions not to mention SDB
• Tiernari et al. (2004) investigated children following a childhood experience(s) to see if these experiences predicted any adult characteristics. (But this research has low validity because children may be unable to understand the consequences/impact of their experiences
Explain the evaluations of the schizophrenogetic mother?
Its complete Rubish
• By the 1980s research had concluded that there was no such thing as a ‘Schizophrenogenic mother’.
• It had become apparent that only a small percentage of women who might arguably fit the criteria of schizophrenogenic mother had actually produced schizophrenic children.
• Conversely,peoplewithschizophreniawerefoundto have mothers who did not fit the criteria.
• The theory has been criticised for hindering progress in psychiatry and understanding of this complex disorder
Explain the evaluations of Double Blind Theory
• There is some support for • the theory, i.e. Berger (1965) found that people with schizophrenia reported a higher recall of double-bind statements by their mothers than controls.
• However, this evidence may not be reliable as patients’ recall may be affected by their schizophrenia
Other studies find little support for the theory:
• Liem(1994) and Hall and Levin (1980) found no difference in the patterns of parental communication in families with a child with schizophrenia in comparison to normal families.
Explain the positive evaluations of EE
However
Brown (1966)
• People recovering from schizophrenia and discharged from hospital were followed up over a 9-month period.
• Interviews with family members were conducted to determine the level of expressed emotion
• Families where expressed emotion (EE) levels were high resulted in 58% of people with schizophrenia returning to hospital for further treatment
Compared to only 10% of those from low expressed emotion families.
This shows that the relationship with a family can have a big impact
But it may be the other way around (cause and effect)
Negative evaluations of EE?
• It is unclear whether EE is a casual agent in the relapse rates or just a reaction to the patient’s renewed symptoms
• High EE communication patterns are not specific to schizophrenia (neuroses, eating disorders)
Methodological Issues in EE
There is more evidence in Western Families
EE is usually measured in 1 interview. This is very unreliable
