interactionist approach

• p: one strength of the interactionist approach is evidence supporting the role of both vulnerability and triggers.

  E: Tienari investigated the impact of both genetic vulnerability and psychological trigger. 19000 finnish children whose biological mothers had been diagnosed with sz. in adulthood this high genetic risk group were compared to a control group of adoptees without a family history of sz. it was found high levels of criticism were associated with the development of sz.

  L: This shows that a combination of genetic vulnerability and family stress can lead to greatly increased risk of sz
• P: One limitation of the original diathesis stress model is over simplicity. Its now clear the original model that portrayed diathesis as a single schizogene and portrayed stress as schizophrenogenic parenting is hopelessly simplistic.

  E: Multiple genes in multiple combinations influence diathesis. Stress also comes in many forms. diathesis can also be influenced by psychological factors and stress can be biological as well as psychological.

  L: This means that there are multiple factors, both biological and psychological, affecting both diathesis and stress
• P: One strength of the interactionist approach is in the combination of biological and psychological treatments

  E: A practical application of acknowledging biological and psychological factors in sz has been the combination of drug treatment and psychological therapies. Studies show that combining treatments enhances their effectiveness. Tamor, randomly allocated participants to (1) medication + CBT, (2) medication + counselling or (3) mediaction only. those in two combination groups showed lower symptoms than the medication only group
• link for tamor

  L: This means theres a practical advantage to adopting an interactionist approach to sz in terms of superior treatment outcomes