Psychopathology Flashcards
(42 cards)
What is Failure to Function?
When someone is unable to cope with the ordinary demands of everyday life and unable to maintain basic standards of nutrition and hygiene
Seligman: signs of this include distress and irrational behaviour
Evaluate Failure to function
+ Doesn’t only use objective views, acknowledges patients experiences, is useful to assess abnormality.
- Discriminates and limits freedom of minority groups, hard to distinguish behaviours from deviation of social norms
- Subjective judgement from individual psychiatrists may be incorrect in others opinions
What is Statistical Infrequency?
When an individual has a less common characteristic
Example: 2% of people have a IQ below 70, this is an abnormality
Evaluate Statistical Infrequency
+ Real-life application, diagnosis of intellectual disability disorder. Also used when measuring how severe symptoms of mental disorders are. High ecological validity.
- Unusual characteristics can be positive, an IQ above 130 is just as uncommon as those below 70, would not be applicable for diagnosis without using other methods
-Not everyone benefits from a label, labels may negatively affect how people view themselves.
What is deviation from social norms?
Behaviour that is different from the accepted standards of behaviour. Norms are specific to culture: Homosexuality was considered abnormal in the past and still is in some cultures.
2019 Brunei: Homosexual acts by men are punishable by death.
Evaluate deviation from social norms
+ Real-life application, Antisocial personality disorder, Deviation from social norms is part of the DSM-5 therefore is valued in psychology.
- Different cultures have different social norms and therefore different ideas of what behaviour is viewed as abnormal, Cultural relativism
- Can lead to absence of human rights if it is relied on for too long, to maintain control over groups, removes individuality.
What is Deviation from ideal mental health?
When someone doesn’t meet a set of criteria for good mental health.
Jahoda: Ideal mental health criteria:
-Ability to self actualise
-Rational thinking
-Independence
- Realistic view of the world
Evaluate Deviation from ideal mental health
+ Highly comprehensive, sets good examples to discuss mental health, checklist for diagnosis and a checklist for people to work towards to improve their mental health
- Cultural Relativism- it is focused for individualist cultures not collectivist
- Sets an unrealistically high standard for mental health
What is a phobia?
An irrational fear of an object or situation
Phobia: DSM-5 categories
When a fearful response is taken out of proportion compared to the object they fear.
-Specific phobia: Object
-Social Anxiety: Social situations
-Agoraphobia: Public/ outdoor spaces
Phobia: Behavioural categories
-Panic: crying, running away, children may freeze or tantrum
-Avoidance: conscious effort to avoid contact with the phobic stimulus
-Endurance: remains in presence of the phobic stimulus but experiences high levels of anxiety.
Phobia: Emotional characteristics
-Anxiety: unpleasant state of high arousal (fear: immediate and extremely unpleasant response to a phobic stimulus)
Phobia: Cognitive characteristics
-Selective attention: unable to focus on anything rather than the phobic stimulus
-Irrational beliefs: increases pressure to perform well
-Cognitive distortions: unrealistic perceptions
Phobia: Behavioural approach
Explains behaviour in observable terms
MOWRER: 2 process model
-Acquisition by classical conditioning: pairing of the NS with the UCS (triggering a fear response), creates a CS that causes the CR, this is then generalised to similar objects.
-Maintenance by operant condition: Negative Reinforcement= avoidance of the phobic stimulus this results in the desired consequence which means the behaviour will be repeated
Phobia: Treatments: SD
Systematic desensitisation: Gradually reduces the phobic anxiety through classical conditioning
-Counterconditioning: Learning a new response to the same stimulus
-Reciprocal inhibition: One emotion prevents the other
Method:
1. Anxiety hierarchy: list of situations related to the phobic stimulus, rated least to most frightening
2. Relaxation: teaches how to deeply relax
3. Exposure: exposed to the phobic stimulus whilst in a relaxed state, over several sessions the stimulus becomes stronger.
Phobia: Evaluate SD
+ Effective, Gilroy: after 33 months patients became less fearful , it is effective for specific phobias.
+ Effective for learning disabilities, not a stressful experience and doesn’t include rational thinking
+ Accessible and pleasant experience
Phobia: Treatments: Flooding
Immediate exposure to phobic stimulus, removes the ability of avoidance
-Extinction: The CS is experienced without the UCS, the CS no longer produces the CR
- Ethical issues are likely, patients must be fully aware and prepared and provide full informed consent
Phobia: Evaluate Flooding
+ Cost-effective, can work in one session unlike SD, and is cheaper and more effective for some phobias
-Not effective for social phobias as they are more complex and every social situation is different
-Traumatic: many patients withdraw, is a waste of time and money and leaves patients traumatised and more fearful of the phobic stimulus
What is Depression?
Mental disorder characterised by low mood and energy levels
Depression: DSM-5 categories
-Major depressive disorder: severe short term
-Persistent: long-term or reoccurring
-Disruptive: childhood tantrums
- Premenstrual: prior to or during menstruation
Depression: Behavioural characteristics
-Activity levels: reduced or or psycho-motor agitation (increased)
-Disrupted sleep and appetite
-Aggression and self-harm
Depression: Emotional characteristics
- Lowered mood: worthless feelings
-Anger: towards themselves of others - Lowered self-esteem
Depression: Cognitive characteristics
-Poor concentration: interferes with work/school
-Dwelling on negative thoughts: recall of unhappy events, glass half-empty
-Absolutist thinking: thinking events are all-good or all-bad, absolute disasters
Depression: Cognitive approach: BECK
3 parts to cognitive vulnerability
-Faulty information processing: focusses on negative aspects of a situation, ‘black and white’
-Negative self-schemas: interpret all information about themself negatively
-Negative triad: negative view of the world, future and self
