Critically Compare and Contrast the Community Psychology and Public Health Approaches to Social Problems

Community psychology and Public Health share many values, methods and theories, yet they also differ in many visible ways. While Community psychology focuses on mental health and social welfare issues within the community setting and is about understanding people within their social environments and using this understanding to improve their well-being (AlleyDog, 2013), Public Health sets out to prevent disease, encourage good health and extend the life of the population through organised measures, whether they be public or private. It attempts to provide conditions in which populations of people can be healthy as it does not focus on individual diseases or patients; hence it is concerned with the whole system, not only the abolition of a particular disease (WHO, 2013). With regard to social problems, both community psychology and public health will be examined playing attention to the similarities and differences of the fields.

Historically, Community Psychology and Public Health were established to bring about necessary changes in the communities which started in the USA during the 1960’s and spread to South Africa during the 1980’s as a starting point for prevention (PYC4811 tutorial letter 102, 2013). While both fields share similar concerns, they also differ in many ways. Both adopt a prevention orientation of diseases and problematic behaviour rather than cure and both assume similar methods of study by not concentrating solely on the individual but as communities as a whole. However, public health and community psychology differ in its concern with social institutions, quality of life and most obviously with its emphasis on mental health (PYC4811 tutorial letter 102, 2013).

Seedat, Cloete and Shochet (1988) address two out of the four models in community psychology, namely the Mental Health Model and the Social Action Model. The Mental Health Model attempts to reinforce, preserve and increase human resources in order to prevent mental disorders with the...