biological explanations

• Gottesman suggested that if there is more genetic similarity between family members it can increase the risk of developing schizophrenia.
• There are also a number of candidate genes associated with schizophrenia so it seems to be polygenic, meaning multiple genes are involved.
• Ripke et al (2014) conducted a large scale study and found 108 separate genetic variations associated with the risk of schizophrenia.
• The dopamine hypothesis: the neurotransmitter dopamine is thought to be involved in schizophrenia as it affects several brain systems which are implicated in symptoms of schizophrenia
• Hyperdopaminergia is when there are high levels or activity of dopamine in Broca’s area, which may be responsible for speech poverty and auditory hallucinations.
• Neural correlates are measurements of the structure and function of the brain which correlates with experience.
• The ventral striatum is believed to be involved in anticipation so any abnormalities in this region of the brain may be involved with the development of avolition. Therefore activity in the ventral striatum is a neural correlate of negative symptoms of schizophrenia.
• Gottesman found a 48% concordance rate between monozygotic twins for schizophrenia
• Tienari et al shows that children of schizophrenic biological parents are still at high risk if adopted into families with no history of schizophrenia
• In a meta-analysis including 212 studies, Leucht (2013) found that drug treatments that work via normalising dopamine levels were more effective than a placebo
• Curran et al suggest that dopamine agonists such as amphetamines which increase levels of dopamine can make schizophrenia worse and can even induce symptoms in non-sufferers
• An issue with the theory into neural correlates is that research only suggests a relationship and not necessarily cause and effect.
• The biological explanations for schizophrenia are reductionist
• Hypodopaminergia is low levels of dopamine in the prefrontal cortex, which may trigger negative symptoms of schizophrenia.