Interactonist approach

What is the Interactionist approach

• acknowledges range of factors like biological, psychological & social involved in SZ

• Biological- genetic vulnerability, neuro chemical abnormality

• Psychological- stress from life events

Diathesis stress model

• vulnerability (diathesis) and trigger (stress) needed for onset of SZ

• views SZ as result of interaction between biological (diathesis) and environment (stress)

• Person developing SZ is partly determined by their vulnerability and amount of stress they experience

Traditional diathesis stress

• diathesis is entirely genetic- single schizogene led to schizotypic personality that’s sensitive to stress

• those without schizogene wouldn’t develop SZ despite having high stress

• but carriers of gene were vulnerable to develop SZ if they experience chronic childhood and had schizohrenogenic mum

Modern diathesis

• no single schizohene- instead many genes can lead to SZ

• range of factors beyong genes like psychological trauma- trauma is diathesis not stressor

Modern view of stress

• cannabis use can develop SZ- it’s a stressor as it increases risk of SZ by 7x as it interferes with dopamine system

• But most cannabis users don’t develop SZ suggesting other factors

Strength- application to treatment for SZ

• randomly allocated 2 groups of patients to biological and psychological, therapies and a control group just taking biological treatment (meds)

• Found patients in 2 combination groups has lower level symptoms than control group but was no diff in hospital readmissions

• Could be due to patients stop taking their meds due to side affects

• Suggests taking interactionist approach over using biological or psychological treatments alone reduces suffering

• BUT combining treatment working doesn’t mean interaction approach is correct- could be an error called treatment causation fallacy

Strength- research support from Tienari

• investigated combo of genetic vulnerability and parenting style in children adopted from Finnish mums with SZ

• Adoptive parents were assessed for child rearing styles & rates of SZ compared to control group of adoptees without any genetic risks (mums with SZ)

• Found child rearing styles with high critics, conflict and low empathy was associated with developing SZ but only got ppl with genetic risk

• Supports interactionist approach that genetic vulnerability & family related stress are important in SZ development

Limitation- problems in determine the causal diathesis in the model

• diathesis–stress model says biological vulnerability interacts with environmental stressors to produce SZ but unclear which factor is primary cause.

• early life stress may cause person to develop maladaptive coping strategies, making them less able to manage stress later in life- what appears to be “stress” may actually shape person’s vulnerability over time

• So diathesis may not always be genetic- could be the result of environmental experiences that reduce resilience to stress so hard to know true causal factor in SZ developemnt

• suggests the interactionist approach may oversimplify the relationship between vulnerability and stress.