psychopathology

• definitions of abnormality 


  statistical infrequency

  deviation from social norms

  failure to function adequately

  deviation from mental health
• statistical infrequency 


  infrequent behaviour or characteristic is considered abnormal

  rare / uncommon characteristic

  e.g. a really high or low IQ (intelligence)
• deviation from social norms

  behaviour that is different from the accepted standards of behaviour in a society
• failure to unction adequately

  when someone is unable to cope with ordinary demands of day-to-day living
• deviation from mental health

  when someone does not meet a set of criteria for good mental health
• strength of statistical infrequency

  real life application in the diagnosis of intellectual disability disorder

  therefore, there is a place of statistics infrequency in thinking about what are normal and abnormal behaviours and characteristics

  actually all assessments of patients with mental disorders includes a measurement against a normal statistic

  THEREFORE - statistical infrequency is a useful part of clinical assessment
• weakness of statistical infrequency

  unusual characteristics can be positive

  an IQ of 130 is unusual but we wouldn't think of it as a undesirable characteristics that needs treatment

  just because some display characteristics that are statistically 'abnormal' doesn't mean it requires treatment to return to normal

  this is a serious limitation to the concept of SI and means that it would never be used alone to make a diagnosis
• weakness of statistical infrequency

  not everyone unusual benefits from a label

  where someone is living a happy fulfilled life, there is no benefit to them being labelled as abnormal regardless of how unusual they are

  so someone with a very low IQ but was not distressed, quite capable of working, would simply not need a diagnosis of intellectual disability

  if a person is labelled as abnormal, this might have a negative effect on the way others view them and the way they view themselves
• strength of deviation from social norms

  it has real life application in the diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder

  therefore there is a place for deviation from social norms in thinking about what is normal or abnormal

  HOWEVER, there are other factors to consider, for example distress to other people resulting from antisocial personality disorder

  so in practice, deviation from social norms is never the sole reason for defining abnormality
• weakness of deviation from social norms

  cultural relativism

  social norms vary from one generation to another and from one community to another

  this means that, for example, that a person from one cultural group may label someone from another culture as behaving abnormal according to their norms in their culture

  for example, hearing voice may be acceptable in some cultures but would be seen as mentally abnormal in the UK

  this creates problems for people from one culture living within another culture group
• weakness of devotion from social norms

  can lead to human rights abuses

  too much reliance on deviation from social norms to understand abnormality can also leas to systematic abuse of human rights

  the classifications appear ridiculous nowadays - but only because our social norms have changed

  more radical psychologists suggest that some of our modern categories of mental disorder are really abuses of people's rights to be different
• strength of deviation from social norms

  social versus statistical norms

  it includes the issue of the desirability of a behaviour

  the statistical infrequency approach doesn't take desirability into account.

  for example, genius is statistically abnormal but we wouldn't want to include that in our definition of abnormal behaviours

  this means that social norms can be more useful that statistic norms
• strength of failure to function adequately

  patients perspective

  it does attempt to include the subjective experience of the individual

  it may not be an entirely satisfactory approach because it is difficult to assess distress, but at least this definition acknowledges that experience of the patient (and/or others) is important

  in a sense, the definition captures the experience of many of the people who need help

  this suggests that failure to function adequately is a useful criterion for assessing abnormality
• weakness of failure to function adequately

  is it simply a deviation from social norms?

  in practice it can be hard to say when someone is really failing to function adequately when they are just deviating from social norms

  e.g. those who practice extreme sports could be accused of behaving in a maladaptive way, whilst those with religious or supernatural beliefs could be seen as irrational

  if we treat these behaviours as 'failures' of adequate functioning, we risk limiting personal freedom and discriminating against minority groups
• weakness of failure to function adequately

  subjective judgements

  when deciding wether a person is failing to function adequately, someone has to judge wether a patient is distressed or distressing

  some patient may say they are distressed but may be judged as not suffering

  there are methods for making such judgements as objective as possible, including checklists such as Global Assessment of Functioning Scale

  HOWEVER, the principle remains that someone has the right to make this judgement
• strength of deviation from ideal mental health

  its a comprehensive definition

  it covers a broad range of criteria for mental health

  it probably covers most f the reasons some one would Kees help from mental health services or be referred for help

  the sheer range of factors discussed in relation to Johoda's ideal mental health make it a good tool for thinking