Explain different psychological approaches to health practice.
Extracts from this document...
Introduction
Unit 8: Psychological Perspectives for Health and Social Care. P2: Explain different psychological approaches to health practice. There are six different psychological approaches in psychology. I have talked about these in great detail in my previous assignment P1, I will now discuss the different psychological approaches to health practice. The six psychological approaches are; Behaviourist perspective*, Social learning theory, Psychodynamic perspective, Humanistic perspective, Cognitive perspective* and the Biological perspective. The behaviourist perspective is all about believing that learning has occurred when you can see the changes in behavior. The behavioral learning model is the result of conditioning. Conditioning suggests that a reward following a desirable response acts as a reinforcer and increases the likelihood that the desirable response will be repeated. Reinforcement is the most important part of the behaviorist approach. A paediatric nurse in a healthcare setting provides reinforcement at each step of the process. For example, when a child is having to get a blood test done and is afraid and refusing to do so calmly, the nurse will look for a positive behavior and then gives the patient immediate reinforcement by saying, ?you are such a big boy, well done!? or ?you did an excellent job with that!?. ...read more.
Middle
This will help both their behaviour, but also their self-esteem. Humanist learning theorists view learning as a function of the whole person and believe that learning cannot take place unless both the cognitive and affective domains are involved. The individual?s capacity for self-determination is an important part of the humanist theory. For example, humanist theory is used to help post myocardial infarction patients regain a sense of personal control over their health care management. It helps patients recover from their treatment and be able to help patients and other people, having empathy is crucial for this. This requires healthcare professionals to be able to listen to what the other person has to say, respect them regardless of how they feel or think and really try to gain an understanding of the emotions that they may be feeling. An example of this can include when a healthcare professional is trying to communicate with a patient that suffers from extreme anorexia. The patients belief is that the smallest of foods will make them obese and unpleasant to look at. As much as our professional minds know this statement is untrue we have to put aside our thoughts and try ?putting ourselves in their shoes? only then will you be able to fully empathise with the patient and try to help them. ...read more.
Conclusion
Nurses who work overnight shifts have to fight this urge to be sleepy on their shift, where the body is telling them to go to sleep, and they have to attempt to go to sleep when they get home in the early hours of the morning and your body is telling you to start waking up and energizing for the day ahead. The psychodynamic perspective says that behavior is driven by unconscious forces in which we have little control over. These subconscious forces can be presented through slips of the tongue or in dreams and represent the unconscious truth. In a healthcare setting, these subconscious forces are studied to determine a diagnosis or disorder. The use of the psychodynamic theory can be helpful in many healthcare related situations where the patient is unable to tell the doctor directly what it is they are experiencing in terms of symptoms, psychodynamic would allow doctors and other healthcare professionals to see into the inner mind to attempt to diagnose the patient and see if the problem is more memory/mental related as opposed to a physical wound which could be easily diagnosed. ...read more.
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Here's what a teacher thought of this essay
4 star(s)
This essay has some good descriptions about different approaches that can be used in health care. There are some good points but it is a little let down through choosing inappropriate examples that do not really demonstrate the ideas in context. Choosing better examples would really enhance the essay.
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Marked by teacher Sam Morran 26/06/2013
