Holism vs reductionism

• Holism vs Reductionism

  debate revolves around determining the appropriate level of explanation for psychological phenomena
• Example of how the same phenomena can be explained at different levels

  Depression can be explained at a psychological level, such as sustained negative thoughts and low mood

  
  

  But these thoughts and emotions can also be explained biologically, by referring to things like neurons firing and neurotransmitters binding to receptors

  
  

  You can go even lower, such as by breaking down your description of neurons and neurotransmitters into basic physical components such as atoms
• Reductionism and the biological approach

  The biological approach leans heavily towards reductionism. E.g. a proponent of this approach might argue that behaviour can be explained entirely in terms of physical/biological causes without reference to higher level of explanation, such as a person's upbringing or cognitions
• Reductionism and the behaviourist approach

  the behaviourist approach can be reductionist. For example, an extreme behaviourist might explain behaviour solely in terms of conditioning without reference to lower levels of explanation such as the underlying biology
• Holism and the humanistic approach

  The humanistic approach is arguably the most holistic approach. It treats every person as a unique individual that cannot be reduced to simple explanations e.g. in explaining a person's depression, humanisitic psychologists would consider their genetics and biology but also the person's experiences, upbringing, and general social context and culture in which they live
• AO3-More scientific

  reducing variables and behaviour enables psychology to be conducted in a scientific - i.e repeatable, quantifiable and objective way - e.g. reducing schizophrenia to dopamine activity enables researchers to objectively determine whether someone has schizophrenia and reliably measure whether a treatment is effective or not
• AO3-Practical applications

  - e.g. biological reductionism resulted in SSRI's for depression
• AO3-Overly Simplistic

  - Reductionism may overly simplify behaviour and miss out important details. E.g. behaviour in the Stanford prison experiment couldn't just be explained biologically - the full explanation would need to include the social context