reductionism vs holism

• holism looks at a system as a whole and deems it inappropriate to subdivide behaviour into smaller units
• reductionism analyses behaviour by breaking it down into its constituent parts and only analysing that one part
• biological reductionism attempts to explain behaviour at the lowest biological level- through genes and hormones
• environmental reductionism attempts to explain behaviour in terms of stimulus-response links that have been learned through experiences
• within reductionism there are levels of explanation used to try and explain behaviour, the lowest level considering biological explanations the middle considering psychological explanations and the highest level considering social and cultural
• a limitation of reductionism is that it tends to be too simplistic, ignoring he complexity of human behaviour
• an advantage of reductionism is that by breaking down behaviour into individual parts, it may possible to understand it in more detail