Individual Differences - Approaches to abnormality and evaluation points

• Put forward by Sigmund Freud in the late 19th Century
• Key assumption is that all human behaviour can be explained in terms of inner mind conflict
• The mind structure is made up of the conscious (where all conscious thinking takes place) and the unconscious (where hidden thoughts and feelings are found)

• Freud said that successful psychosexual development is essential for a healthy personality
• Through each of the three stages of development (oral, anal and phallic), personality develops in the form of the id, ego and superego.
• He believed these were separate conflicting forces, requiring a balance in mental health for a normal lifestyle.

The id

• We are born with the id
• Its energy is called the libido
• Operates on the pleasure principle - "I want"

The ego

• Operates on the reality principle - "Think about it"
• Balances the drives of the id and superego
• Children begin to learn they're individuals and can't always get what they want through toddlerhood
• They recognise their own desires, wants and needs forming the ego

The superego

• Operates on the morality principle - "It is wrong to"
• Includes understanding of right and wrong
• The ideal force - the figure the individual strives to be
• Opposes the id

Freud said that when things go wrong in our lives that we can't deal with, we develop defence mechanisms such as:

• Repression - (burying) of the problem into our unconscious
• Denial - of the problem
• Projection - projecting our problem behaviour onto someone else
• Displacement - our problems are channelled into other things such as eating
• Regression - we go back several stages in our personality development

• Provides some believable explanations but lacks empirical research evidence
• Freud based his ideas mainly on analysis of middle class Viennese women
• He only studied one child (Little Hans) when developing his theories and he only corresponded with the child's father, not the boy himself
• His theories were revolutionary for the time they were developed as they suggested that abnormality could be caused by things other than medical issues or evil spirits
• They also paved the way for other models to be developed, such as the behavioural and cognitive model
• There is much evidence suggesting that adult disorders can be caused by childhood trauma, despite a lack of scientific evidence
• The theory tends to over focus on sexual issues and ignores the importance of interpersonal and social factors in causing abnormality
• The psychodynamic approach is determinist, as it says suffering childhood trauma will lead to abnormal behaviour in adulthood
• It ignores the influence of genes, reward and thinking patterns

• The approach perceives mental disorders as negative thoughts and illogical beliefs
• Beck's cognitive triad: 
• The three illogical thought processes of the triad cause irrational negative feelings about self - called "cognitive errors"
• Ellis (1962) suggested the A-B-C model for diagnosing abnormality:
  A - Activating event
  B - Belief which may be rational or irrational
  C - Consequence, rational beliefs lead to healthy emotions and irrational beliefs lead to unhealthy emotions 

+ It empowers individuals with the ability to change cognitions
+ Research suggests that faulty thought processes and abnormality is linked
+ The approach allows for free will as it takes into account decision making        and choices
+ It is high in validity and reliability 

- The cognitive approach places the blame for abnormality on the patient
- Faulty thinking may not be the cause, but a symptom of something else 

• J.B. Watson - "Father of Behaviourism" (Little Albert)
• Focusses on the role of the environment in individual development
• Tabula Rasa - theory that we are born as a blank slate and our environment determines how we turn out
• Uses stimulus-response relationships
• Cl***ical conditioning - learning through ***ociation
  Neutral Stimulus (NS) --> No response
  Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS) --> Unconditioned Response (UCR)
  Conditioned Stimulus (CS) + Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS) --> Conditioned Response (CR) 
• Operant conditioning - learning through consequence, focusses on reward and punishment
  - Reinforcement - anything increasing the likelihood of repeated behaviour.
  - Positive reinforcement - reinforcement using pleasant consequences when they happen
  - Negative reinforcement - reinforcement using pleasant consequences when they stop
  - Punishment - anything unpleasant decreasing the likelihood of repeated behaviour
  - Continuous reinforcement - the desired behaviour is reinforced every time it occurs
  - Partial reinforcement - the response is reinforced only part of the time
  - Vicarious reinforcement - reinforcement from seeing others rewarded and punished

+ Does explain the role of the media and its influences - Becker (1999)
+ Proven results
+ Uses observable behaviour - evidence that can be seen

- Some phobics can't remember a neutral stimulus, which could suggest not all phobias are behavioural
- Disorders like schizophrenia are hard to explain in terms of the behaviourist approach
- It is very simplistic and reductionist
- Lots of research is conducted on animals
- Determinist - reinforced behaviour WILL be carried out, no free will 

• The cause of a disorder - think BING:
  - Brain injury
  - Infection
  - Neurotransmitters
  - Genetics 
• Genetics - individuals may inherit certain disorders from relatives, especially parents
• Abnormal behaviour could be as a result of an individual's biochemistry:
  - Neurotransmitters may contribute to disorders
  - Schizophrenia - excessive amounts of dopamine
  - Bi-polar depression - high levels of serotonin 
• Neuroanatomy - the structure of the nervous system may be involved in some disorders
• Post-mortem schizophrenics have enlarged ventricles in the brain

+ Medical evidence
+ Scientific proof and explanations
+ Most reliable tests - replicable with the same results
+ No blame

- Reductionist
- Genetics don't provide complete explanation
- Drugs don't always work
- Physical irregularities may be symptoms not causes
- Might cause patients to become passive/dependant on treatment/doctor
- Focusses on curing symptoms, not the causes
- Some ethical/moral issues