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SCHIZOPHRENIA; A psychotic disorder characterised by the loss of contact…

- - - - Strengths;
        
        Can be used along side psychological therapies.
        
        Allow patient to live in society and avoid long term stay in hospitals.
        
        Strong evidence supporting dopamine hypothesis in relation to drug treatment and experiments are controlled and objective
        
        1/3 of SZ people have psychotic symptoms that never return after drug treatment
      - Weaknesses;
        
        Immediately prescribed them and can't come off them once on (chemical straight jacket.
        
        People forget to take their medication
        
        Ignores social factors and environmental factors when prescribed which could effect relapse
        
        Only effective in 60% of cases and patients left with awful side effects, which are unpleasent and fatal
    - - Strengths;
        
        Choose to have CBT its not complusory
        
        Allows patient to stay out of a hospital and be in society
        
        Focuses on comorbidity symptoms of SZ and negative symptoms
        
        Addresses all symptoms of SZ
        
        More ethical as it relies on the therapist and patient to work together
      - Weaknesses
        
        Unethical as it can be distressing to focus on positive symptoms as they have to question their own beliefs
        
        Don't always attend CBT sessions
        
        Hard to test the effectiveness of CBT as research is subjective
- - - - Excess dopamine has a stimulant effect
      - Anphetamines (psychotics) produce similar symptoms to those of excess dopamine
      - Some genes linked to dopamine production are more frequent in SZ
      - Drugs to increase dopamine in people with parkinson's give psychotic symptoms
    - - PET scans show blocking dopamine receptors doesn't always remove the symptoms
      - Glutamate could also be implicated
      - Social and environmental factors are involved
      - Different types of dopamine receptors in different areas of the brain give different results
- - - - Works with the dopamine hypothesis and expands on it
      - Lots of evidence to support it (animal studies)
    - - Animal studies lack generalisiability to humans
      - PET SCANS lack validity and can be seen as intrusive
- - - - People with SZ can't distinguish between actions driven by external forces and those driven by internal intention. They have increased self-awareness (the inability to filter out unnecessary cognitive noise.)We don't consciously filter out and process every thought or decision. SZ'z can't filter out these minor processes as their filter is faulty. Frith believes the faulty filter is due to the irregularity of neuronal pathways connecting the hippocampus to the pre-frontal cortex, linked to the regulation of dopamine. This explains auditory hallucinations and delusions
    - - Believes some psychotic symptoms arise from a disconnection between stored knowledge (schemas) and current sensory input. SZ people can't differentiate schemas from new situations, they don't know which stimuli to attend to and which to ignore. Internal events are misinterpreted as sensations caused by external stimuli result in hallucinations caused by abnormalities in the hippocampus.
- - - - Gottesman 1991; Looked at 40 different twin studies. He found that 48% of MZ twins both had SZ. DZ twins 17% both had SZ
        
        EVALUATION;
        
        Strengths;
        
        Some genetic link to SZ.
        
        Weaknesses;
        
        Not entirely genetic otherwise concordance rates would be 100% in MZ twins as they share exactly the same genes.
        
        May not be sure if the Identical twins are identical especially young twins as DNA testing was rare/ non exsistent so lacks validity
        
        Environmental factors
    - - First degree relatives (Brother, sister, mother) share 50% of their genes. Second degree relatives (aunties, uncles, cousins) share 25% of their genes
      - Gottesman 1991; Found that SZ is more common in biological relatives with SZ. The closer the genetic link the greater the risk. If a brother or sister has SZ there is an 8% chance. If both your parents have SZ there is a 46% that you will get it.
    - - Sekar et al (2016); analysed 100,00 DNA samples of people with SZ from 30 different found C4 gene in the immune system. This gene plays a role in synapse pruning which happens during adolescence. Excess pruning causes SZ symptoms. Explains why SZ occurs after adolescence and why their brains cerebral cortex is thinner and they have fewer synapses.
    - - Separate out the effects of the environment and genes.
      - Heston 1947; followed 47 children born to a SZ mother but then adopted within 3 days of birth to families not associated with their biological ones. Later in life they were compared with a control group. 11% of the experimental group developed SZ compared to none in the control group.
        
        EVALUATION;
        
        Weaknesses;
        
        Adoption studies are retrospective
        
        Demand characteristics
        
        May be subjective because of the knowledge that the other family member (biological mum) had SZ when diagnosing
        
        methodological problems which effects the validity of the diagnosis.
        
        Strengths;
        
        Data provides a strong genetic link for SZ