Lecture 1 Flashcards
What are the 4 main objectives for scientific study of behaviour?
- Describing: what behaviours are evident - do they fulfill criteria for a disorder
- Explaining: why a behaviour is evident
- Predicting: outcome
- Managing: behaviours that are considered problematic
What is the Relativist view
Symptoms & causes vary across cultures
What is the Absolutist view
A disorder is caused by the same biological factors
How do you define abnormal behaviour?
NO CLEAR-CUT DEFINITION. Largely subjective
is the individual behaving differently, deviantly, dangerously or dysfunctionally abnormal?
Does the behaviour cause distress or dysfunction for the individual or others
Duration
How many elements of abnormality are there and list them all?
- Personal suffering
- Maladaptiveness
- Irrationality and incomprehensibility
- Unpredictability and loss of control
- Level of emotional distress
- Interference in daily functioning
- Vividness and unconventionality
- Deviations from the norm (developmental, societal & cultural) - Observer discomfort
- Violation of moral and ideal standards
What does the DSM-5 focus on?
Symptoms and scientific basis.
- clinical presentation: what specific symptoms cluster together
- etiology: what causes the disorders
- developmental stage: does the disorder look different for children than it does for adults
What are involved in mental disorders?
Present distress
Disability (impairment in one or more areas of functioning)
Significant risk of suffering death, disability, or an important loss of freedom
What did Thomas Szasz say?
Clinical labelling leads to stigma and discrimination
What is epidemiology
They study of the frequency and distribution of disorders within a population
What does incidence refer to?
Incidence refers to the number of NEW CASES of a disorder that appear in a population within a specific time period.
What does prevalence refer to?
Prevalence refers to the TOTAL number of ACTIVE cases in a given population during a specific time period.
What is comorbidity?
Comorbidity means that more than one condition is present
What is life-time prevalence
Lifetime prevalence is the proportion of the population that is affected AT SOME POINT during their lives
Rank from greatest to least the lifetime prevalence rates of mental disorders
- Major depression
- Alcohol abuse
- Drug abuse
- PTSD
- Panic disorder
- Bipolar mood disorder
- OCD
- Schizophrenia
- Bulimia nervosa
- Anorexia nervosa
What were the three categories Hippocrates classified mental disorders into?
- Mania
- Melancholia
- Phrenitis (brain-fever)
What was the common conception for the cause of diseases during ancient times?
That ALL forms of diseases had natural causes.
Imbalance in essential fluids such as blood, phlegm, yellow and black bile. Thus, treatment procedures focused on restoring balance.
During Middle Ages how was abnormal behaviour viewed?
Interpreted as the work of the devil or witchcraft (exorcism). Many with mental disorders treated like witches.
Mentally challenged individuals were viewed demonically.
Who criticized demonology and what were their reasons?
Paracelsus - stars and planets affected the brain
Weyer - First physician to specialise in the treatment of mental illness
What was the first major asylum and How was the treatment of mentally ill individuals in asylums?
London’s Bethlehem Hospital
Treatment consisted of CONFINEMENT (isolation), TORTUROUS PRACTICES (ice-cold baths) and MEDICAL TREATMENTS (bloodletting)
When did reform into mental illness treatment begin, and who was a key figure during this time?
19th century; Philippe Pinel
List Pinel’s Classification System
- Melancholia
- Mania
- Mania with delirium
- Dementia
- Idiotism
List Kraepelin’s classifiers
Dementia praecox
Mania depressive psychosis
List somatic treatments (Slide 31)
Fever therapy - blood from people with malaria injected into patients to develop fever. Reason: symptoms sometimes disappeared in patients who became ill with typhoid fever
Insulin coma therapy - inject insulin to lower blood glucose levels and induce a hypoglycemic state and deep coma. Reason: observed mental changes among some diabetic drug addicts who were treated with insulin
Lobotomy - sharp knife inserted into skull to sever nerve fibers connecting the frontal lobes to the rest of the brain. Reason: saw decrease in negative emotion during stress among chimpanzees after performing same procedure
Who were involved in the psychoanalytic revolution
Franz Mesmer: neurologist who identified hysterical disorders and treated them with HYPNOSIS
Freud: trained by Jean Charcot, developed free association theory
Joseph Breuer: Hypnosis + catharsis
