1 / 9

Schizophrenia: Psychological Theories

Schizophrenia: Psychological Theories. Family systems theory Psychosocial & environmental stress. psychlotron.org.uk. Family Systems Theory. Origins in: The psychoanalytical tradition (the influence of the family on abnormal behaviour)

MikeCarlo
Download Presentation

Schizophrenia: Psychological Theories

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Schizophrenia: Psychological Theories • Family systems theory • Psychosocial & environmental stress psychlotron.org.uk

  2. Family Systems Theory • Origins in: • The psychoanalytical tradition (the influence of the family on abnormal behaviour) • Systems thinking (idea that things are best understood by looking at the relationships between a set of entities) psychlotron.org.uk

  3. F M C1 C3 C2 Family System A family can be seen as a set of entities, each interacting with all the others. The behaviour of each entity can only be understood by looking at its relationships with the others psychlotron.org.uk

  4. F M C1 C3 C2 Family System If one person starts to behave abnormally the problem might not lie within that person Their behaviour may be a manifestation of a problem occurring within the wider family system C2 psychlotron.org.uk

  5. Double Bind Theory (Bateson, 1956) • Schizophrenia is a consequence of abnormal patterns in family communication • The patient is a ‘symptom’ of a family-wide problem • They become ‘ill’ to protect the stability of the family system psychlotron.org.uk

  6. Double Bind Theory • In a double bind situation a person is given mutually contradictory signals by another person • This places them in an impossible situation, causing internal conflict • Schizophrenic symptoms represent an attempt to escape from the double bind psychlotron.org.uk

  7. Double Bind Theory • Bateson (1956) reports clinical evidence (interviews, observations) illustrating use of double bind communication by parents of schizophrenia patients • Issues of researcher (confirmatory) bias • Problems with direction of causality psychlotron.org.uk

  8. Double Bind Theory • Liem et al (1974) compared communication patterns in families with & without a schizophrenic member • Abnormality in parental communication was a response to the schizophrenic symptoms, not vice versa • Some issues with ecological validity psychlotron.org.uk

  9. Double Bind Theory • Some evidence that family processes play a role in relapse of schizophrenia patients following stabilisation • Relapse more likely (58% vs. 10%) where family is high in ‘expressed emotion’ (Brown et al, 1966) • Families high in criticism, hostility & over-involvement lead to more relapse (Vaughn & Leff, 1976) psychlotron.org.uk

More Related