Pain: Psychosocial Factors Critique

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  • Created by: Psych951
  • Created on: 07-01-19 16:40

Pain: Psychosocial Factors Critique

Advantages

  • Learning theories help explain why the context in which the pain occurs may affect one's experience of it e.g. birth and helps explain how people associate pain with reward
  • Understanding affect can help to understand how the pain perception is formed and what maintains the current experience of pain
  • Considers the meaning, importance and perceived control over the individual's pain and thus is more applicable
  • Acknowledges that the cognitive, learning and behavioural processes interact to form a pain experience

Disadvantages

  • Ignores sex differences: Women more readily experience pain and respond differently to treatment (Keogh, 2008)
  • Learning theories may explain the maintenance and degree of pain but cannot help understand the initial onset
  • Doesn't explain the mechanisms behind the pain sensation and the cognitive and learnt processes
  • Little is known about the mechanisms behind these links
  • Need to consider more about the social comparisons and other's opinions in forming pain experience

Evaluation

Clear that many psychosocial factors may interact to form the pain experience, however the mechanisms behind these links are unknown and so it is difficult to understand the contribution of each. 

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