Psychopathology

Question 1

Define abnormailty

Answer 1

Psychologcal condition or behaviour that differs from most people (social norm)

Question 2

Define depression

Answer 2

Mental disorder that causes people to experince a depressed mood

Question 3

Statistical norm

Critisicm of abnormality

Answer 3

• Abnormality accounts for frequency of behaviour and not its desirability
• Can’t distguish between rate behaviour that is eccentric and rare behaviour that is psychlogically abnormal

Question 4

Define abnormality that deviates from social norm

Answer 4

Some people behave in a way different from the social norm and social expectation they are seen as different

Question 5

Social norm not stasticial

What are the critiscm of abnormality

Answer 5

• Discrimination against people
• Social norm and attitude changes over time

Question 6

Jahdoa (1958) 6 conditions

Explain abnormality as deviation from mental health

Answer 6

• Positive self attitude
• Personal growth
• ability cope with stress
• being in control of own decisions
• accurate perception of reality
• ability to adapt with changes in environment

Question 7

What are the critiscm of Jahdoa study on mental health

Answer 7

• Degree to which person meets the critea can change over time
• Subjective standard - difficult to measure things like self esteem

Question 8

Define phobias

Answer 8

• Phobia are form of anxiety disorder which the emotional response to an often harmless object has become a fear to them
• Irrational fear that is out of proportion

Question 9

Explain symptons of phobias

Answer 9

• Physical symptons - body response to stress such as hyperventilation and increased hearty rate
• Behavioural symptons - Individual will try to avoid the fear which can impact everday life
• Cognitive symptons - anxiety can decrease concentration and impair person ability to complete complex task

Question 10

Define OCD

Answer 10

Anxiety disorder that involves compulsive thoughts and compulsive behaviour

Question 11

Explain symptoms of OCD

Answer 11

• Physical symptons - body responds to stress such as hyperventilation and increase heart rate
• Behavioural sympton - compulsive behaviour such as the urge to carry out a specific behaviour or task

Question 12

Diagnostic of OCD

Answer 12

• Acknowledge the problem but are scared to overcome
• Suffer from serve anxiety
• Suffer from serve depression
• Experience either obsession or compulsion

Question 13

Symptons of depression

Answer 13

• Physical symptons - Lack of energy, loss of weight and appetite
• Behavioural symptons - Stops socialising, loeses intertest in daily activties may attempt suicide
• Emotional symptons - Feelings of sadness and despair and absence of feelings

Question 14

Diagnostic criteria of depression

Answer 14

• extreme sadness
• tearfulness
• depressed moods
• loss of interest in pleasure and activities

Question 15

Three assumptions behaviour approach makes

Answer 15

• All behaviour is learned
• what has been learned can be unlearned
• abnormal behaviour learned same way as normal

Question 16

Stimulus (unconditonal)

How can phobia can be learnt through classical conditioning

Answer 16

• Starts from an unconditonal stimulus and this triggers a natural reflex but if another stimilus happens at the same time, when this stimimulus happens again it can elict the fear
• An example a loud noise and this creates fear during this stimulus another one being baloons

Question 17

What is operant conditioning

Answer 17

Learning through positve and negative reinforcement (Punishments and rewards)

Question 18

Explain how phobia can be learnt through operant conditioning

Answer 18

• Actions are either rewarded (positive reinforcment) or punished (negative reinforcement)
• we will repeat the behaviour if the outcome is good but not if the outcome is not
• If someone has a phobia they are scared of something so to keep their anxiety and stress levels down they will avoid it and that postively reinforces

Question 19

Dogs, albert

Give an example of Classical conditioning

Answer 19

• Pavlov dogs - learned to associate food with a ringing of a bell
• Little Albert - Learn to associate a white rate with loud noises

Question 20

Watching others, Bandura

Explain social learning theory and give an example of a research

Answer 20

• We learn certain behaviour by observing others and copying them
• Bandura Bobo doll
• Mineka et al (1994) monkey video

Question 21

Operant and classic conditioning

Explain how we learn and maintain phobias with the two process model

Answer 21

• Learning and maintance involves classical and operant conditioning
• Classical conditoning - fear is learnt by association
• Operant conditoning - Avoiding the fear (explains why phobia persist)

Question 22

Classical conditioning

How can you treat phobias using the behaviourist approach

Answer 22

To unlearn the abnormal behaviour the treatment will be based on classical conditioning, unlearning the inappropiate behaviour and replacing it with new behaviour

Question 23

define desensitisation

Answer 23

Overconumpstion in violent media reuces emotional impact on violence because people become ‘used’ to it

Question 24

define systematic desensitisation

Answer 24

A person with a phobia is slowly reintroduced to the fear

Question 25

How does systematic desensitisation work

Answer 25

* Person phobia broken down into small parts * patient taught to relax and made to create a fear hierarchy * starting with the stimuli that creates the less fear and building it up with the muslce relaxation techniques

Question 26

What does the systematic desensitation consist of

Answer 26

* Construction of the hierarchy * Relaxation trainining * Graded exposure (imagination) * pratice in real life

Question 27

Explain the critiscm of the behavioural approach

Answer 27

* Seen as dehumanising as it reduces humans to programmed stimulus and responses

Question 28

# systematic desentisation What did McGrath et al (1990) find

Answer 28

**70%** of his P's found improvment BUT few patients were completely free of anxiety

Question 29

How does the cognitive approach explain depression

Answer 29

Assumes the human mind is like a processor and people can control how they select information and store it

Question 30

Explain beck (1967) cognitive triad

Answer 30

* Negative view about the world * Negative view about the future * Negative view about self

Question 31

Explain Ellis ABC model (1962)

Answer 31

A - **Activating agent** (example getting a B in an exam) B - **Belief** (can be rational or non rational) C - **Consequence** (can be healthy or unhealthy)

Question 32

# Schemas Explain how Beck explains depressioon

Answer 32

Beck believes patients cause of negative thinking is through the negative triad, negative schemas and cognitive biases

Question 33

How does most cognitive therapy work

Answer 33

1. Getting patients to recognist irrational thoughts 2. Agreeing on a more realistic approach 3. Putting this into pratice via a real life situation

Question 34

Define cognitive behaviour therapy and the assumptions

Answer 34

* Recognises importance of changing both behaviour and thinking * Thoughts, behaviour and feeling all influence eachother * role of therapist is to help patients identify **irrational thought** and change their thoughts (**negative bias**)

Question 35

# A lot of patients Butler et al (2006) findings

Answer 35

studied 10000 patients and found CBT was effective in treating depression (**better then anti depressants**)

Question 36

# reductionism Explain critiscm of CBT

Answer 36

* Approach states people are responsible for their psychological problems and could lead to people being blamed for **abnormalities** * Approach is reductionist as it ingnores biologial causes such as **genetics**

Question 37

How does serotonin link to agressive behaviour

Answer 37

Low level of serotonin can be linked to a agressive behaviour (serotoin regulates mood)

Question 38

What is beta blockers

Answer 38

Drugs that act on the **sympathetic nervous system** rather than the brain to **reduce** heart rate and blood pressure reduce the effects of stress

Question 39

# Immunity Why can cortisol damage health

Answer 39

Cortisol is a stress hormone and it damages health as raised levels can decrease immune function

Question 40

# Relatives Findings of Lenane (1990)

Answer 40

**Lenane (1990)** found that relatives who had OCD **30%** of relatives to those also has it

Question 41

# **Zohar et al (1996)** Neural explanation for OCD

Answer 41

* OCD can be due to low level of serotonin (**nerotransmitters**) * **Zohar et al (1996)** - found drugs that increase serotonin levels benefited 60% of OCD suffers

Question 42

What are some drug treatment for OCD

Answer 42

1. Beta blockers - act on the automatic nervous system (**ANS**) to reduce anxiety by reducing heart rate and blood pressure 2. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibiator (**SSRI**) - Increase level of serotonin as OCD can be a cause of low level of serotonin

Question 43

# Drug therapy, easy to use and cheap **Advantages** of biological approach for treating OCD

Answer 43

* Drug therapy can be used along side CBT * Easy to use and does not involve patients changing lifestyle * Cheap compared to other therapy such as CBT

Question 44

# Ethical concerns, not treat (**suppress?**) **Criticism** of Biological approach treating OCD

Answer 44

* Some drugs have unpleasants side effects and can lead to depdency also addiction * Suppress the symptons and not cure the disorder