• Home
• Study
• Study Information
• Modules
• Module Information

Critical Perspectives in Addiction Psychology

Module description

Students of psychology are frequently asked to provide critical evaluations of empirical evidence, but less often directly trained how to do this. In this module, students will be taught critical evaluation skills by studying examples of contentious, ambiguous, or flawed evidence within addiction psychology, and how this impacts decision making in wider society. Addiction psychology is apposite for this purpose because the problem of addiction is far from solved, claims about the mechanistic basis and optimal solutions differ widely, and observed effects are often small, dubious, and inter-interpreted revealing the self-serving bias of researchers to the cost of substance users themselves. Critical addiction psychologists argue that addiction science must achieve a higher level of integrity and be subject to close critical scrutiny to ensure that stakeholders across society (politicians, funders, police, clinicians, councillors, medics etc.) have access to the best available knowledge to make informed decisions which benefit marginalised substance user groups.    

Module aims - intentions of the module

Students will scrutinise primary sources to arrive at evidence-based conclusions regarding the most important bio-psycho-social determinants and interventions for addiction. Students will track how this scientific knowledge is used by wider stakeholder groups to make informed decisions in relation to addictive agents and users, revealing the translation and impact of scientific knowledge in practice. The module is flexible so student can choose for their assessed work to focus on topics which are of most interest or relevance to their intended work specialisation. For example, students could focus on biomedical, experimental, clinical, educational, forensic, legal or humanities content, to build expertise for job roles in medicine, science, health, clinical psychology, teaching, educational psychology, criminal justice, law or social work, etc. The module aims to balance training in the critical evaluation of scientific and clinical evidence, the comprehensive understanding of addiction, and the personalisation of learning experience to facilitate career progression.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Critical evaluation of empirical evidence underpinning contentious claims in addiction psychology.
• 2. Understanding of methods for evaluating the integrity and biases influencing scientific judgements.
• 3. Persuasive communication of evidence-based arguments concerning the determinants and interventions for human addiction.

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 4. Acquire detailed knowledge within the discipline and demonstrate advanced critical understanding of this knowledge.
• 5. Review and critically evaluate published work at an advanced level and present a logical, coherent and sustained argument to support conclusions.

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 6. Interact effectively and supportively within a learning group
• 7. Manage your own learning using the full range of resources
• 8. Take responsibility for your own work and criticise it
• 9. Engage effectively in debate in a professional manner

Syllabus plan

Each lecture will focus on a contentious issue within addiction psychology which has important implications for how stakeholders in society understand or intervene to address the problem of addiction, to reveal how the accuracy of scientific knowledge is crucial for the form and effectiveness of decision making. The following topic areas are indicative of the content that will be covered, but the details and running order may vary depending on staff availability:

• Scientific integrity
• Locating theories of addiction on the bio-psych-social continuum
• The link between mental health and addiction
• Rise and fall of epistemically violent outgroup-cognitive-deficit theories
• Critically evaluating the brain disease model of addiction
• Growing trends in psychedelics
• Sex and gambling addictions
• Drugs and the brain
• Models of addiction and treatments
• Addiction, genetics and the environment

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Where you have been referred/deferred in the coursework you will be required to resubmit the coursework. If you are successful on referral, your overall module mark will be capped at 40%; deferred marks are not capped.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

1. Yakushko, O. (2019). Eugenics and its evolution in the history of western psychology: A critical archival review. Psychotherapy and Politics International, 17(2), e1495.
2. Hall W, Carter A, Forlini C (2015) The brain disease model of addiction: is it supported by the evidence and has it delivered on its promises? The Lancet Psychiatry 2: 105-110.
3. Alexander, B. K. (2022). A final conversation with addiction professionals. Addiction Research & Theory, 1-10.
4. Earp, B. D., Lewis, J., & Hart, C. L. (2021). Racial justice requires ending the war on drugs. The American Journal of Bioethics, 21(4), 4-19. doi:10.1080/15265161.2020.1861364

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

• ELE – Faculty to provide hyperlink to appropriate pages

Key words search

Psychology, Addiction, Critical,