Addictive behaviour
Characteristics of addiction
Mark Griffiths created the 6 criterias that need to be met for beh. to be considered an addiction. He created these for behavioural addictions however they can also be applied for substance addictions. These are as follows:
- Salience- activity becomes the most important thing in the individual's life. It dominates their thoughts, feelings and behaviour.
- Mood modification- individual engages in the AB, they experience a change in mood e.g. get a 'high' or calming effect.
- Tolerance- refers to the effect of time on the AB. Over time they need more of the substance or behaviour to feel the same effect as they have built up a tolerance for it.
- Withdrawal symptom- these are experienced if a person stops the AB and they will experience unpleasant signs: physical or psychological.
- Conflict- falls into two categories: intrapsychic (conflict within themselves) or interpersonal (conflict where the AB compromises relationships with others).
- Relapse- addicts have a strong tendency to stop the AB but then return to it.
Biological explanations
Dopamine
Describe (10 marks)
- Argues that it hijacks the brain via the release of Da through the mesolimbic pathway (MLP). This explanation views AB as a 'disease of the brain'.
- Suggests AB trigger surge of Da from the VTA, which is received by receptors in the nucleus accumbens (NA) which leads to the sense of pleasure. = person INITIATES AB
- Research has shown that repeatedly carrying out AB leads to a decrease in D2 receptors and decrease in Da= tolerance. If they stop they will experience withdrawal symptoms.= person MAINTAINS AB
- Nora Volkow argues there are more complex brain processes involved in CREATING the actual addiction.
- Da is also sent to other areas of the brain and as AB escalates so does the involvement in those areas.
- AB changes brain circuits in the prefrontal cortex which decides what to pay attention to. This causes the brain to place more importance on the AB and cues associated with it.
- Another area is the dorsal striatum. Da stimulates neurons which help form habits of identifying enjoyable patterns.
- Amygdala creates the 'good memories' of the AB
Evaluation (10 marks)
P: ✅ useful applications
EV: Champix= drug help to quit smoking. Works by binding to the nicotine receptors tricking the brain into thinking it had nicotine leading to a release of a small amount of Da, this stops cravings. Won't feel pleasure by smoking as Champix has blocked receptors.
EX: Supports Da explanation and gives validity to the theory that Da is involved with addictions such as smoking.
P: ❎ can't explain all addictions.
EV: Stokes found no sig. increase in Da levels in volunteers taking cannabis
Yoder found no consistent increase in Da across ppts who were given alcohol.
EX: Da= inadequate explanation of AB and at best can explain some addictions but not all.
P: ❎ highly reductionist
EV: reduces complex behavior such as A down to the role of Da and reward pathways and processes.
EX: Weakness as it ignores important influences on AB e.g social factors, personality and cognitions which have a body of research to support them. More appropriate explanation = diathesis-stress model which suggests individuals have a biological pre-disposition to AB but only results in addiction of there is an environmental trigger e.g trauma.
P: ✅ compelling evidence.
EV: Da agonists are used to treat Parkinson's by copying the effects of Da in the brain. 1 in 7 patients taking these drugs have experienced side effects such as impulse control leading to compulsive gambling, sex and shopping.
EX: Therefore this clearly demonstrates there is a link between Da and AB.
Applying one biological explanation to modifying AB (5 marks)
- A bio explanation would argue that AB is due to the release of Da along the MLP. This leads to a sense of pleasure therefore person repeatedly engages in AB to gain sense of pleasure. To modify this Champix has been used.
- Champix= binds to nicotine receptors tricking the brain into thinking it has had nicotine leading to small release of Da which stops cravings. If individual does smoke, they wont feel pleasure as receptors are blocked.
Genes
Describe (5 marks)
- Da receptor gene has been implicated in AB. Some individuals have a variant of this gene: D2A1 gene which has been suggested as a cause of AB.
- D2A1 gene results in person having fewer D2 receptors in the NA. This means that this person feels very little pleasure from normal activities and so overcompensates by engaging in AB to overstimulate the receptors they have.
- Comings et al found that 48.7% smokers carried D2A1 gene compared to 25.9% non-smokers.
50% gamblers had the gene compared to 25.9% non-gamblers.
-Carol Lerman compared the DNA of non-smokers and chronic smokers and found that non-smokers were more likely to have the SLC6A3-9 gene. Having this gene was found to: reduce the risk of becoming a smoker, if they did smoke it started later than age 16, if they did smoke it made it easier to quit.
- This gene reduces Da transmission therefore smoking does not give such a 'buzz'
Evaluate (5 marks)
P: ✅ high scientific validity
EV: As they are based on objective, measurable, and well established scientific principles. For e.g gene mapping is used to identify specific genes such as the D2A1 gene.
EX: Therefore explanation is well respected by wider scientific community and general public.
P: ❎ highly deterministic
EV: as it implies that our genetic makeup e.g D2A1 gene determines our behaviour.
EX: Problematic as it ignores the role of FW which in turn removes personal responsibility and could mean that the addict might think that engaging in treatments is pointless as they believe it is not something they could control.
P: ✅ supporting research evidence.
EV:Comings et al found that 48.7% smokers carried D2A1 gene compared to 25.9% non-smokers.
50% gamblers had the gene compared to 25.9% non-gamblers.
EX: This provides support to the role of genetic factors. However, the results do not show 100% have this gene.
Individual Differences Explanations
Personality
Describe (10 marks)
Eysenck developed a 'resource model of addiction' in which he argued that addiction develops because it fulfils a need relating to a person's personality.
Eysenck and Gassop compared the personality of over 200 addicts and a control group of non-addicts. They used EPQ and looked for common patterns in scores on the EPQ amongst addicts. They found that addicts had higher scores on psychoticism and neuroticism but lower extraversion and lie scores.
Key trait of psychoticism is impulsivity and this trait can explain AB.
Dalley et al conducted research using rats and found that impulsive rats had higher cocaine intake than low impulsivity rats.
Laura Stevens found that impulsive individuals were less successful in treatment programmes as they were more likely to drop out and less likely to achieve abstinence.
Neuroticism= this personality type self- medicates to deal with the anxiety they experience. Sinha highlighted the the role stress plays in the initiation of addiction beh. but also relapse. They use AB to overcome the stress.
Another trait of neuroticism is low self-esteem. Baumeister argues that this may lead individuals to use AB in order to escape self-awareness.
Evaluate (10 marks)
P: ❎ methodological issues with research into personality and AB.
EV: a large body of the research is correlational. Personality tests are often given once the person has developed AB.
EX: Therefore cause+effect cannot be established as it may be that the AB causes the individual to be more stressed or more impulsive rather than their personality causing them to seek out AB. Furthermore research relies heavily on personality questionnaires which are prone to social desirability. These issues significantly reduce the validity of the research meaning the explanation does not have adequate supporting evidence.
P: ✅ supporting research
EV: Dalley et al found that impulsive rats had a greater tendency to cocaine and Eysenck and Gossop found in a sample of 200 drug addicts evidence of high psychoticism and neuroticism scores.
EX: Therefore this supports the role of personality traits such as neuroticism and psychoticism in AB giving the explanation validity.
P: ❎ personality may depend on the AB
EV: McNamara researched impulsive rat's tendency to self-administer cocaine and heroin found that rats who were impulsive self-administered high levels of cocaine but NOT heroin.
EX: This research casts doubt on the notion of an AP and suggests that maybe only certain AB can be influence by personality rather than all AB.
P: ❎ too simplistic
EV: as it suggests complex AB are the results of personality traits alone.
EX: This is a weakness because this explanation fails to account for other influences such as genes, peers and cognitions which have evidence to implicate their role in AB. Therefore unlikely to be solely due to personality traits. A better explanation may be one that accounts for an interaction between personality and other factors.
Cognitive biases
Describe (5 marks)
- Cognitive biases are irrational beliefs that can lead to maladaptive behaviour . One cognitive bias linked to AB is attentional bias.This is where addicts may focus more attention to stimuli related to the addiction and ignoring other stimuli in the env.
- Another one is the illusion of control. This is the belief that you can control events or outcomes that in reality you have no control over. For example, choosing a slot machine cos that one looks like its gonna make me win.
- Another one is self serving bias. This is the tendency to attribute success internally and failures to external factors. For example, if the gambler wins he think he is a great poker player but if he loses he think its just an unlucky deck of cards.
- Another bias is the gambler's fallacy. This is where a gambler thinks that if something happens more often than normal then it is less likely to happen in the future.
Evaluate (5 marks)
P: ✅ supporting research evidence
EV: Mark Griffiths found that regular gamblers showed more irrational verbalisations e.g 'the machine likes me' (14%) compared to non-gamblers (2.5%).
EX: Therefore this gives validity to cognitive biases explanation of AB in particular the role of self-serving bias and illusion of control.
P: ❎ issue is that they are descriptive rather than explanatory.
EV: For e.g attentional bias describes an addict's tendency to be drawn to cues related to the addiction but it doesn't explain why the person becomes addicted in the first place or what causes this bias.
EX: This suggests that cognitive biases may play a role on AB but are not a sole explanation of addiction.
P: ✅ supporting research evidence
EV: Knight et al compared 25 heavy drinkers to 25 moderate or light drinkers on a Stroop test using images connected to alcohol. They found heavy drinkers were quicker when identifying alcohol related stimulus but slower on non-alcohol stimulus.
EX: Therefore this gives validity to cognitive biases explanation of AB in particular the role of attentional bias.
Applying one individual differences explanation to modifying AB (5 marks).
- AB due to irrational thought processes e.g illusion of control.
- Therefore to modify the AB a method which focuses on correcting faulty thought processes is needed,
- This applied to cognitive restructuring (CBT).
- Mark Griffiths found that if he played back the irrational verbalisations these could be used to highlight how irrational they are.
- He found that gamblers were surprised at their thought processes.
- Therefore this could be used to help the addict recognise and restructure faulty thought processes into more rational ones which should reduce the addictive behaviour.
Social Psychological explanations
Peers
Media
Describe (10 marks)
- There are 2 social norms which influence AB: Descriptive and injunctive
- Social norms are standards of acceptable behaviour that are set by a social group. Perceived social norms are what we think are the norms for out social group.
- Descriptive social norms= our perception of how much others engage in the AB
2. Injunctive social norms= refers to what we perceive as others' approval of certain beh.
- If a person overestimates the descriptive and/or injunctive norms in relation to an AB then they are more likely to engage in AB.
-The behaviourist approach would argue that AB are learnt from the env. Bandura proposed social learning theory to explain how AB may be learnt indirectly from people around us through observing a model and imitating them. There are two key processes:
- Observing a model engaging in AB
- Motivation to imitate the behaviour.
- Same age and gender are likely to influence peers.
Evaluation (10 marks)
P: ❎ supporting research is often correlational
EV: This means that cause and effect can not be established between peers and addiction. Do peers cause addiction, or do we choose friends with similar interests/ beh. The complexity of peer influences is demonstrated by Ennet and Bauman's research. They found that non-smokers with peers who smoked were more likely to smoke. But they also found that individuals switched friendships groups in-line with their smoking beh.
EX: Therefore this suggests that it is not only peer influence but also peer choice that can explain the link between peers and smoking.
P: ✅ supporting research evidence
EV: Morton and Farhart found that 39/40 prospective studies showed a positive correlation between peers and smoking.
EX: this supports the role of peer influences in addiction. Furthermore, as the research involved prospective studies this allows for causal conclusions to be drawn increasing the validity of this study meaning it provides compelling support.
P: ❎ too simplistic
EV: as it suggests complex behavior such as addiction is due to solely peer influences. This is a weakness because this explanation fails to account for other influences such as genes, cognitions and other social factors such as media.
EX: Therefore this means that peer influences provide a weak account of AB. A more appropriate method would be the diathesis- stress model.
P: ✅ useful applications
EV: Social Norms Marketing Advertising uses advertising to challenge young people's perceptions of drinking habits. For e.g a trial of SNMA in Welsh universities' published statistics on beer mats such as 'those around you are drinking less than you think' 'few of us approve of those who drink to the point of losing it'. Follow up surveys reported lower perceived social norms for those who had seen the campaign.
EX: Therefore successful applications gives validity to the role of perceived social norms in AB.
Describe (5 marks)
- SLT can be used to explain how the media can exert its influence over us and lead to people to engage in AB.
- We observe behaviour of model in the media (favour actor playing the role of an alcoholic but showing positive side). The models are often TV/ film characters of celebrities
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