Chapter 2

Explanations of Child Behavior Disturbance

Brain and Behavior: The Neuroscience of Disorders

• Four types of abnormality in normal gene replication that can cause physical or mental problems – A single defective gene – Recessive genes – Disarranged or excessively replicated gene

sequences – Incompletely divided chromosomes

Some Basic Concepts of Genetics

• Polygenic Model: Multiple genetic abnormalities are usually required for a person to develop a disorder

• A few serious and progressive neurological disorders (Huntington’s Chorea), and some types of mental retardation (Down syndrome) have genetic basis

• However, little or no accepted evidence of a genetic basis for behavior disorders

Behavioral Genetics

• Aims to discover the contributions of genes to many human behaviors

• Behavioral geneticists study similarities in the most closed related individuals (identical twins)– Adoption studies examine what disorders are

genetic versus developmental– Studies reveal that genes underlie family

similarities in many skills and behaviors

Evaluation of Genetic Models of Abnormality

• Critics charge environment can account for many similarities in twins

• Studying identical and fraternal twins reared apart should be a stronger test– U. of Minnesota study reported personality

similarities among adult identical twins separated at birth

• But researchers did not report lists of dissimilarities

Evaluation of Genetic Models of Abnormality

• Effect of genes may be indirect • Reciprocal gene-environment model: genetic

endowment increases a person’s chances of entering or creating particular types of social situations – Genetic vulnerabilities can increase a person’s

exposure to the very situations that create problems for that person

• Perils of Genetics Research

Perils of Behavioral Genetics Research

• Very difficult to connect specific genes with specific psychological disorders– Complex and subtle contributions of many

genes more difficult to trace– Many psychological disorders difficult to

diagnose– Many of the presumed causal paths cannot be

traced

• No perfect correspondence between brain structure, genes or biochemistry and behavior disorder

• Genetic endowment most often creates predispositions to develop certain disorders, given a particular set of biological and environmental conditions

Structure and Functions of the Brain

• (CNS) Central Nervous System – brain and spinal cord

• (PNS) Peripheral Nervous System – somatic and autonomic nervous systems

• Brain – contains billions of neurons (nerve cells) – Neurotransmitters: chemicals that cross gap between

neurons to transmit or inhibit nerve impulses.

– An excess or deficiency of various neurotransmitters is thought to be involved in many mental disorders

Structure and Function of the Brain

• Some Neurotransmitters– Serotonin: Acts on information processing and

modes. Low activity levels in suicide, aggression, sexual excesses, impulsive overeating

– GABA: Reduces anxiety, inhibits behaviors and emotions, reduces overall arousal, reduces emotional responses

Structure and Function of the Brain

– Norepinephrine: May act to generally regulate or moderate behavioral tendencies

– Dopamine: Activates other neurotransmitters to inhibit or facilitate emotions and behavior. Associated with Parkinson’s disease and possibly with schizophrenia

Links between Brain, Behavior and Psychopathology

• Cerebral Cortex: contains most of the neurons of the CNS and has 4 lobes (frontal, parietal, temporal, and occipital) that have different functions

• HYPAC: hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenalcortical axis is made up of the hypothalamus and endocrine system

• Brain sites below cerebral cortex (midbrain, cerebellum, pons, medulla oblongata and spinal cord) associated with more automatic functions

A Psychodynamic Explanation: Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory

• Four main themes of Freud’s personality theory– Irrationality of humans– Unconscious aggression, sexual jealousy,

anxiety– Formation of personality in early childhood– Need to recognize and overcome early

irrational feelings about parents

Structure of Personality

• Composed of three systems (not anatomical locations, but constructs to explain irrational and conflicted human behavior– Id: first and most primitive component, seeks

immediate gratification– Ego: operates more realistically, decision making

executive branch of personality– Superego represents the harsh moral code derived from

what child believes strict, unforgiving parents want, drives person to try to meet impossibly high standards

Stages of Psychosexual Personality Development

• Freud thought most of adult personality formed in first 5 years– Oral stage: too much or too little oral

gratification can produced oral fixation– Anal stage: over eagerness to please others with

tangible creations, compulsivity about cleanliness

– Phallic stage: resolution of Oedipal Complex

Evaluation of Freud’s Theory

• Demolished general beliefs that children lack sexual interests and adults behave rationally

• Psychoanalysis: an intervention for psychologically disturbed people that guided psychiatric assessment and treatment for decades

Evaluation of Freud’s Theories

• Criticisms– Psychoanalytic theories more self-

contradictory, more complex, and less parsimonious than competing theories

– Lack of rigorous research– Lack of empirical evidence to support

effectiveness– Dated

Freud’s Heritage: Erikson’s Ego Theory

• Ego Identity – individuals healthy solution to a sequence of identity crises associated with each psychological stage

Ego Theory: Stages

• Autonomy vs. shame and doubt (infant)

• Initiative vs. guilt (3-5)

• Industry vs. inferiority (before puberty)

• Identity versus isolation (adolescence)

Ego Theory: Stages

• Intimacy vs. isolation (young adulthood)

• Generativity versus stagnation (maturity)

• Integrity versus despair (old age)

Ego Theory: Evaluation

• Not much more focused or scientifically verifiable than Freud’s theory

Freud’s Heritage: Attachment Theory

• One of the most influential explanations of early social and emotional adjustment

• Normal social development throughout formative years based on infant’s developing trust in “attachment figure”

Attachment Theory: Evaluation

• Difficult distinguish between effects of early attachment quality and later relationships with parents

• Insufficient evidence that early troubled attachment strongly predicts later psychopathology

Freud’s Heritage: Object Relations Theory

• Object relations refers not to physical objects but to human social and emotional relations

• Theory stresses lasting influence of early relationships with important others

• Child forms stable internalized beliefs about himself and other people

Freud’s Heritage: Object Relations Theory

• Introjection – child imitates and identifies with the mother and others, viewing herself as others do

• Internalization – child thinks of herself as dumb or bright, good or bad, reacting as though person who was the original attachment object was still present

Conditioning, Learning, and Cognitive Psychology Explanations

Skinner’s Operant Learning Model

• Two basic types of learning – operant and respondent

• Operant conditioning involves voluntary and purposeful behaviors

Skinner’s Operant Learning Model

• Operant behavior alters or operates on the physical or social environment and is cued by situations that precede it– Discriminative stimuli – stimuli that certain

behaviors can be reinforced– Reinforcing consequences – any event that

strengthens a preceding operant response or makes it more likely to occur

Skinner’s Operant Learning Model

• Operant Behavior can be eliminated through extinction – Extinction – when usual reinforcement is

completely withheld for a prolonged period

Punishment and Negative Reinforcement

• Negative reinforcement increases the rate of behavior it follows exactly as positive reinforcement does– Operant behavior is repeated because it

removes an aversive stimulus

• Punishment – delivery of an aversive stimulus following some action, which reduces future probability of that behavior

Evaluation of Skinner

• Skinner provided focused, general, easily understood and parsimonious explanation of human behavior

• Some say he is too grounded in animal research to explain complex human activities

• Behavioral geneticists argue that some behavior is hereditary and not learned

Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory

• Humans can exert great control over our own conduct regardless of external influences

• A person’s interpretation of an event is the chief determinant of that person’s reaction.

• Humans adept at observational learning (imitation, modeling)

Sources of children’s abnormal behavior

• Exposure to socially deviant models

• Insufficient reinforcement

• Inappropriate reinforcement or reinforcement of undesirable behavior

• Faulty learning

• Fictional reinforcement contingencies

• Faulty self-reinforcement

Self-Efficacy and Behavior

• Theory attempts to explain the mutual interacting influences of people’s self-perceptions and their behavior

• Self-Efficacy – Your belief in your own ability– Self-efficacy convictions can be self-fulfilling