psychological explanations

• Psychological explanations include family dysfunction which are ways of communication within families that includes high levels of expressed emotion, cold parenting and poor communication
• One psychological explanation is the double bind theory, proposed by Bateson et al. he emphasised the importance of communication within families. If a child constantly receives contradictory messages from parents, it can lead to the child to fear doing the wrong thing incase of punishment, such as a withdrawal of love. This therefore means that a child can fail to develop an internal sense of reality which can ultimately lead to paranoid delusions. An example of the double bind theory would be a mother telling her child she loves them, however, says it with a look of disgust.
• Another psychological explanation is expressed emotion - style of communication where families usually show high levels of negative emotions towards a person with schizophrenia - can include as verbal criticism, hostility and emotional overinvolvement. If an individual experiences high levels of EE within families, it can cause stress beyond the individuals coping which leads to a schizophrenic relapse or episode. Lizen et al suggests that an individual living in a household with high expressed emotion is 4x more likely to relapse that an individual living in a low expressed emotion household.
• SCHIZOPHRENOGENIC MOTHER - FROMM-REICHMANN

  • based on accounts she heard from patients and their childhoods, common situations included a cold, rejecting and controlling mother which creates a tense and secretive environment leading to distrust and ultimately paranoid delusions
• A03

  +One strength of the double bind theory is research support by Berger et al. He found that compared to a control group of non-schizophrenic individuals, patients with the condition had a higher recall of double-bind phrases from childhood. This therefore supports the double bind theory as a valid explanation for the onset development of schizophrenia, providing external validity through this study as participants recalled real life events. 
• A03

  -However, BERGERS study lacks reliability as it relies on self-report of people with schizophrenia. This means childhood memories could have been distorted by retrieval failure or interference. Moreover, as individuals would’ve been suffering with hallucinations and delusions it suggests that this could’ve affected the accuracy of their childhood memories. Therefore, this means that the study lacks internal validity and generalisability which thus limits the double bind theory as a risk factor for schizophrenia.
• A03

  +One strength of family dysfunction is evidence through read et al, who found that childhood trauma and attachment types affect the risk of developing schizophrenia. Through a review on schizophrenics, he found that people with the condition are disproportionately more likely to have an insecure attachment type (type c/d). Furthermore, they also found that 69% of women in the study and 59% of men had experienced a history of sexual abuse. This therefore provides support for family dysfunction and childhood trauma as increasing the risk of schizophrenia.
• A03

  • studies have a poor evidence basis. All the studies rely on observations/Informal assessments of patients or their families. This therefore reduces reliability of studies, as families may adapt behaviour to make it seem better, with lower levels of hostility/coldness towards schizophrenic, thus making it harder to draw accurate conclusions from the studies conducted and finding a basis for the cause. Additionally, as it doesn’t use objective methods, it lacks scientific credibility and means studies cannot be replicated as confounding and extraneous variables will be present.