Anxiety

Question 1

DSM-s + Anxiety

Answer 1

-separation anxiety disorder
- selective mutism
- generalised anxiety disorder - disproportionate worry over everyday things
- specific phobia
-panic disorder
- social anxiety disorder

Question 2

Limbic system + Anxiety

Answer 2

• Anterior cingulate cortex
• prefrontal Cortex
  -ventromedial Cortex (orbitofrontal)
  -Amygdala

Question 3

urbach-wiethe Disease- Amygdala + Anxiety

Answer 3

• Feinstein et al >
• AMygdala destroyed
• doesn’t feel fear/ anxiety in response to external fear provoking stimuli

Question 4

Genetic influence + anxiety

Answer 4

-Hettema et al ->
- laid out many genetic influences
- A1 + A2 genes are common amongst all anxiety disorders
-ASP specific genes to specisic disorders

Question 5

environmental factor: Locus of control + anxiety

Answer 5

• Hudson + Rapee-> the more controlling the mothers parenting style the more anxious the children
• when present monkey with something fearful it runs to its mum

Question 6

Locus of control - monkey study + anxiety

Answer 6

-master monkey obtain food + water by pressing levers
- delivered at same time to yoked monkey
-later in life yoked monkeys generally more anxious as they had lack of control in early life of food

Question 7

DSM-5 generalised anxiety disorder

Answer 7

• 2 criteria:
  A) excessive anxiety + worry occurring more days than not for 6 months
  B) 3 + of the following symptoms: restlessness, easily fatigued, difficulty concentrating, irritability, muscle tension, sleep disturbance

Question 8

Nitsche + amygdala activity for general anxiety

Answer 8

-large response of multiple Amygdala regions in response to aversive + neutral pictures

Question 9

Treatment for general anxiety disorder

Answer 9

-Wetherell et al -> SSRI effective in reducing worry symptoms + CBT helped more

Question 10

DSM-5 specific phobias

Answer 10

-criteria A= fear/ anxiety about a specific object or situation
- criteria B = phobic object almost always provokes immediate fear

Question 11

Phobias + external cues

Answer 11

-Neutral stimulus VS scary stimulus
-pairing of initial unfeared puppy with a scary dog produces a conditioned response + you associate the 2 with fear

Question 12

phobias- avoidance component

Answer 12

• Aversive conditioned stimuli (small puppy) generally avoided in future
• Never learn it isn’t scary
• Aversive stimuli become neg reinforcers

Question 13

Learning Theory of Phobias -Watson + Raynor

Answer 13

• conditioning unite rat + presented to albert
  -when albert touched rat loud sound occurred
• when first presented with objects he wasn’t afraid of
  . The conditioned: he begin to cry after the loud noise
• when showed a rabbit he started crying
• conditioned fear was generalised to other similar objects

Question 14

Evaluating Learning Theories of phobias

Answer 14

• conditioning of emotional reactions is predisposed towards some stimuli more than others
• ohman et al-> potentially phobic stimuli (snakes; spiders) more conditionable than flowers, mushrooms (non -emotive stimuli )
• When non-phobic objects were feared it was almost immediately extinguished

Question 15

phobias- Beh therapy- modelling

Answer 15

• Therapist performs beh on patients hierarchical list while they watch
• learn that the phobia isn’t scary

Question 16

phobias- Beh therapy- Flooding

Answer 16

• full exposure to stimuli from outset
  -low takeup rates but effective
  -initially very fearful but learn they’ve come to no harm + anxiety subsides

Question 17

phobias- Beh therapy- systematic desensitisation

Answer 17

-patient learns basic relaxation techniques
- draws list of hierarchical fear situations
- begin at bottom work way up to most feared removing anxiety at each stage
- reasonably effective

Question 18

DSM-5-panic disorder

Answer 18

• criteria A: recurrent unexpected panic attacks
  -palpitations, sweating, breathless, dizziness

Question 19

Panic disorder- interoceptive cues

Answer 19

• random internal event, small internal signals, unbothered
  -large internal signals = state of panic -large response
• small internal events will come to trigger larger physical response through pavlovian association
• Avoid anything that triggers fear of panic attack
• intetoceptive conditioning = classical conditioning of panic attacks in response to bodily sensations

Question 20

panic disorder + most responsive brain regions

Answer 20

-Domschke et al - presented fearful vs non-fear images to panic disorder ppts
- hyperactivity in amygdala + orbitofrantal cortex

Question 21

Panic Disorder- Interoceptive cues study

Answer 21

• Ehlers + Breuer
  -people with phobias or panic disorders showed similarly high levels of trait + state anxiety
• panic disorder sig more accurate in monitoring own heart rate
  -phobias had highest error rate
• intetoceptive conditioning = classical conditioning of panic attacks in response to bodily sensations

Question 22

panic disorder - virtual treatment of conditioned interoceptive response

Answer 22

-Botella et al-> systematic desensitisation to internal cues incl heart rate response to virtual reality exposure
-worked as well as actual exposure even 12 months after to real situations

Question 23

Panic disorder- exposure training + breathing tech

Answer 23

• Sanchez-Meca et dl meta-analysis concluded exposure/desensitisation training coupled with relaxation/breathing training is most effective

Question 24

2 factor model of anxiety disorders- fear conditioning

Answer 24

• • Mowrer’s
• classical conditioning -> learn to fear neutral stimulus that is paired with intrinsically aversive stimuli (UCS)
• gain relief by avoiding CS
• Through operant conditioning, avoidant response is maintained by reinforcing the fear
  -weaknesses : many can’t remember a threatening event triggering symptoms, may experiencing serious threat don’t dev anxiety

Question 25

Anxiety disorders + unpredictable threats

Answer 25

- shackman + Tromp et al - people with anxiety Particuarly sensitive to unpredictable, diffuse or remote threats -ppts assigned to undergo the 3 conditions -Anxiety related to increased affective psychophysiological response to Unpredictable threat condition compared to healthy controls

Question 26

genetic influences

Answer 26

- Aggen et al - large twin study suggested heritability estimate of 0.5 - 0.6 for anxiety disorders -genetic vunerability May explain 50-60% of risk for anxiety

Question 27

Medial prefrontal cortex activity + amygdala -anxiety

Answer 27

-Grilion et al-> those with anxiety disorders display less activity in medial prefrontal cortex when viewing threatening stimuli -medial prefrontal cortex regulates amygdala activity -Kim et dl -> pathway linking amygdala + medial prefrontal Cortex may be deficient among those with anxiety disorders

Question 28

Behavioural conditioning of social anxiety disorder

Answer 28

-person can have a neg social experience + be classically conditioned tor fear similar situations which they avoid , reinforcing it -few opportunities for fear to be extinguished -interacting with others may show avoidance through safety beh

Question 29

Social cog influence + social anxiety disorder

Answer 29

- Too much focus on neg self-eval, internal cues + soc hierarchy - unrealistically harsh views of ben + overly neg beliefs about consequences - Attend more to how they are doing in social situations - Too much focus of internal cues = don't pay attention + perceived as uninterested

Question 30

Panic disorder + classical conditioning

Answer 30

-panic attacks often triggered by internal bodily sensations of arousal -clasically conditioned responses to situations triggering anxiety

Question 31

Panic Disorder- catastrophic misinterpretation of somatic change Study

Answer 31

-Clark -Pape, Mattirk + Murrell -> before breathing CO2 enriched air ( breathing rate increases = panic) some given full explanation of sensations they were gonna experience, others weren't - Those received explanation less likely to panic