Taylor Walker
D1 - Evaluate two psychological approaches to health and social
care provision
The two psychological approaches that can be used in health and social care provisions
that I will be evaluating are the behaviourist and psychodynamic perspectives.
Evaluation of the behaviourist perspective
The behaviourist perspective only focuses on our behaviour and the ways in which we
can change it by observing and manipulating a person under laboratory conditions. For
this the environment has to be highly controlled in order to collect the correct objective
quantitative data. Carrying out these scientific experiments show that research is
repeatable because of the controlled ways in which analysis’ have to be done
systematically. With this theory using science it has added status to psychology.
The behaviourist perspective can be seen as the weaker perspective. This is because a
lot of the studies and findings have mainly been on animals. Although animals and
humans’ biology are somewhat similar, their behaviour isn’t and humans can be a lot
more complex. Ethnologist would argue that this perspective is therefore weak as
humans and animals can be very different in different ways down to biology and
behaviour and it also ignores innate biological factors.
Unlike the psychodynamic perspective, the behaviourist perspective concentrates on
the present rather than exploring and individuals thought processes and views
individuals mechanistic manner. The behaviourist perspective also reduces the
complicated processes in which most psychological perspectives have to have a simple
stimulus-response behaviour. This can be seen as a weakness because a more
applicable explanation may have been disregarded.
If this approach was to fail as it could miss the ability of treating underlying problems in
the subjects behaviour that could affect the treatment. It is likely that the behaviour will
return if the treatment has not been fully effective on their underlying behavioural
problems. This could happen with behavioural method control such as systematic
desensitisation or aversion therapy.
The behaviourist perspective may however be rejected by some as it creates ethical
issues. An example of this is when the aversion therapy is used. The client would have
to experience a traumatic period of nausea and this can make us have ethical queries
about this method as it can be used without the consent of a client.
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D1 - Evaluate two psychological approaches to health and social
care provision
The two psychological approaches that can be used in health and social care provisions
that I will be evaluating are the behaviourist and psychodynamic perspectives.
Evaluation of the behaviourist perspective
The behaviourist perspective only focuses on our behaviour and the ways in which we
can change it by observing and manipulating a person under laboratory conditions. For
this the environment has to be highly controlled in order to collect the correct objective
quantitative data. Carrying out these scientific experiments show that research is
repeatable because of the controlled ways in which analysis’ have to be done
systematically. With this theory using science it has added status to psychology.
The behaviourist perspective can be seen as the weaker perspective. This is because a
lot of the studies and findings have mainly been on animals. Although animals and
humans’ biology are somewhat similar, their behaviour isn’t and humans can be a lot
more complex. Ethnologist would argue that this perspective is therefore weak as
humans and animals can be very different in different ways down to biology and
behaviour and it also ignores innate biological factors.
Unlike the psychodynamic perspective, the behaviourist perspective concentrates on
the present rather than exploring and individuals thought processes and views
individuals mechanistic manner. The behaviourist perspective also reduces the
complicated processes in which most psychological perspectives have to have a simple
stimulus-response behaviour. This can be seen as a weakness because a more
applicable explanation may have been disregarded.
If this approach was to fail as it could miss the ability of treating underlying problems in
the subjects behaviour that could affect the treatment. It is likely that the behaviour will
return if the treatment has not been fully effective on their underlying behavioural
problems. This could happen with behavioural method control such as systematic
desensitisation or aversion therapy.
The behaviourist perspective may however be rejected by some as it creates ethical
issues. An example of this is when the aversion therapy is used. The client would have
to experience a traumatic period of nausea and this can make us have ethical queries
about this method as it can be used without the consent of a client.
1
