Biological And Psychodynamic Approach

The main aim of this assignment is to find out the strength and weakness, similarities and differences between the different approaches of psychology such as biological approach, behavioural approach and psychodynamic approach. I have chosen mental illness to evaluate these approach.

The biological, behavioural and psychodynamic approaches of psychology are connected to the nature and nurture argument. The biological approach highly talks about nature side of the argument and states that all behaviour is biological and is treatable. Whereas the behavioural approach is linked to the nurture side of the argument and state that behaviour is learnt from the surrounding and babies are born Tabla Rosa(blank slate) and all behaviour can be explained.

Feud, the key innovator of psychodynamic approach claimed that adult personality is the product of innate drives (nature) and the childhood experience (nurture) . These innate drives include the structure of the personality, the id, Ego and the super ego as well as the psychosexual stages of development every child passes through, oral stage, anal stage, latency stage, phallic stage and genital stage. If the child does not pass through these processes successfully it could lead to abnormalities in behaviour.

The biological approach to mental illness focuses on the physiology and medical issue that trigger the mental illness. These may involve physical illness such as infection, damage or injuries to the brain or chemical imbalances (hormones imbalance). For E.g. The high level of dopamine predetermine schizophrenic characteristics. Biological treatments often involved use of tablets, injections, electroconvulsive Therapy and surgeries. Studies have shown that the

The biological approach has been effectively practising and treating mental disorders . Drugs therapy has been very popular among the patients and has enabled patients with mental illness to live a reasonably normal life, anti depressant and antipsychotic medications (Tablets) are popular among the patients. Behavioural approach focuses on the behaviour and looks to eliminate unwanted or maladaptive behaviour such as addictions, anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) as they believe the behaviour is learned and can be un-learned via different therapy( Counselling- directory.org.uk, 2017).. Desensitisation and reinforcement technique are popular therapy. Similarly, psychodynamic therapist uses the talking therapy (counselling) to treat people with mental illness, they listen to the patient’s feelings and talk about what had happened in their early life and try to resolve the problem they had. As the studies showed that it was effective among patient with schizophrenia. ( Malmberg,Fenton and Rathbone, 2017). Even though all these approaches have strength to certain extent they have limitation as