Question

What are some of the strengths and limitations of viewing psychopathology as statistical deviance within a population? What about as social deviance compared to population norms?

Answer 1

Viewing psychopathology as statistical deviance means describing any psychopathology in terms of deviance from norm statistically. When a certain phenomenon is infrequent or statistically rare, then it can be termed as Psychopathology.
There are various ways of looking at psychopathology with its set of strength and limitation. So is with the statistical view also.
Strength

It helps in determining what is normal which is the most difficult part with any of views.
Moreover, It helps in determining the cutoff that differentiates between psychopaths and normal.

Limitation

There are certain traits which are rare statistically but are desirable. eg High IQ, above 150. But with this view, a person with high IQ will be regarded as a psychopath.

At the same time, there are certain behaviors which are statistically significant in population but are undesirable. eg Depression in one form or the other is expected to be in 25 % population. The statistical view will consider it normal but actually, it is psychopathology.

The major difference between social deviance and population norm is that social deviance deals with social and cultural abnormalities while Population norms deal with a study within a certain group of people, with the similar behaviors.
strength

It identifies the problem which makes difficult the social adjustment of a person with social deviance. It is a kind of practical Abnormality.
Limitation
It is very difficult to ascertain which act is abnormal if there no consensus on Norm. It is because norms are culture-specific and cannot be applied universally.