Free-will Determinism AO3

Scientific approach (+)

• Deterministic approach allows for the establishment of nomothetic laws of behaviour, allowing scientists to make predictions and control future events

• e.g identifying OCD as caused in part by faulty genetics can help establish a general law (e.g. anyone with these genes are vulnerable to the disorder). Therefore, taking a deterministic and scientific approach can help people at risk, purely because the causes have been identified

Fallacy (-)

• Neuropsych research. e.g. CHun SIong Soon et al (2008) found brain activity relating to whether to press a button with the left or right hand occurs in the brain up to 10 seconds before pts report being consciously aware of making such a decisio

• Suggests there are neurological processes occuring in the background causing the decision we make, meaning our ‘free will’ choices could be the result of biological factors. 

Criminal Justice System (-)

• In the case of Stephen Mobley, who was found guilty of murder, the legal team’s request for genetic testing to see if he had inherited a ‘criminal gene’ had to be thrown out of court

• The notion that this crime may have been committed completely outside of Mobley’s control conflicts with the legal system’s idea that the crime was entirely voluntary. There is a conflict between what psychology and the cjs suggest is a cause of all human behaviour

Interactionist approach

• More holistic, takes into account several types of determinism

• E.g. in schizophrenic patients, the diathesis-stress account assumes they had a vulnerability to developing the condition such as a genetic predisposition caused by a faulty variant C4 gene leading to hyperpruning in the brain. 

• Saying this is the sole cause could be regarded as biological determinism. However, the model then explains how other stressors are also needed for the predisposition to be triggered, such as having a schizophrenic mother (environmental determinsm)