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Evaluating THE Biological Approach

This comprehensive overview examines the biological approach within psychology through four critical contrasting debates: Nomothetic vs. Idiographic, Determinism vs. Free Will, Reductionism vs. Holism, and Nature vs. Nurture. Each debate highlights how the biological perspective interprets behavior, such as depression, through a scientific lens, focusing on genetics, brain chemistry, and environmental influences. We explore strengths and weaknesses of this approach, therapeutic implications, and its relevance in modern psychology, including findings from Selye’s research and the effectiveness of psychosurgery and chemotherapy.

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Evaluating THE Biological Approach

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  1. Evaluating THE BiologicalApproach

  2. Key Terms for the Debate topic • The debates topic involves 4 pairs of contrasting ideas about how you can describe an approach

  3. Number One: Nomothetic Versus Idiographic • A Nomothetic Approach tries to form general rules about behaviour eg “Low levels of serotonin will always be connected with depression” • An Idiographic approach would focus on the different reasons why each individual patient might be suffering from depression

  4. Number Two: determinism versus freewill • Determinism says that everything has a cause: eg a low level of serotonin will cause depression and the individual has no choice in the matter • Freewill says that the individual can freely choose how they act and their behaviour is not caused by internal or external factors

  5. Number Three: Reductionism versus Holism • Reductionism is an approach that simplifies complex phenomena to understand them. For example, people become depressed because of low levels of serotonin. • Holism says that we must look at the whole (complicated) person to understand depression and think of all the factors that affect a person

  6. Number Four:Nature versus Nurture • Nature says that all behaviour is the result of our genes • Nurture says that all behaviour is a result of learning from the environment

  7. For each Debate: • Decide which side the biological approach stands on.

  8. For each Debate: • Think of a strength and weakness of this type of approach and complete the first sheet of your handout.

  9. Useful? • What uses can you think of for the approach? • Theories • How might Selye’s research have an impact beyond psychology? • PTSD

  10. Useful? • Therapies • Psychosurgery: modern techniques are effective • What did Cohen (1999) find? • Chemotherapy: (drugs) • Lithium useful for bipolar disorder • More in the book on chemotherapy

  11. Is it Scientific? • Read the third page of the handout and complete the sections on drug testing for mental illness and the validity issues involved.

  12. Revision summary • Using information from the hand-out and p10-11 of the text book, fill in the PEE table on the final page of the handout

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