Psychopathology

• What is a phobia?


  An overwhelming, irrational and debilitating fear of an object, place, situation, feeling or animal
• What are the three characteristics of disorders?

  Behavioral, emotional and cognitive
• What are the two behavioral characteristics of phobias?

  • Panic - may scream or run away from the phobic object
  • Avoidance - people make every effort to avoid their phobic stimulus
• What are the emotional characteristics of phobias?

  • Unreasonable fear response - when a person is exposed to their phobic stimulus it will produce an intense overwhelming fear response
  • Persistent and excessive anxiety - they are usually in a state of intense, ongoing anxiety in regards to the anticipation of coming into contact with their phobic stimulus
• What are the two cognitive characteristics of phobias?

  • Irrational beliefs - thoughts that the phobic objects is some how out to get them
  • Cognitive distortion - a persons perceptions of their phobia may be distorted e.g a spider may be seen as alot bigger than it actually is
• The two process model is an explanation for phobias
• The two process model includes:

  • learning phobias through classical conditioning
  • maintaining phobias through operand conditioning
• Classical conditioning: Developed through association being formed between an unconditioned stimulus and a neutral stimulus resulting in a fear of the NS.

  
• Who discovered classical conditioning?

  Pavlov
• What study shows classical conditioning for phobias?

  Little Albert study
• • Phobias learnt through classical conditioning tend to become extinct over time.
  • However phobias are maintained by operand conditioning and so can be long lasting
• How does operand conditioning maintain phobias?

  • When a person avoids their phobic stimulus they reduce the feelings of fear and anxiety that they would have experienced if they had remained there.
  • This reduction in fear and anxiety reinforces the bad avoidance behavior so is more likely to be repeated.
  • Therefore the phobia is maintained and is reinforced throught negative reinforcement
• Two process model evaluation:

  Strengths: Useful, Supporting research evidence

  Limitations: Deterministic, reductionist
• What are the two behavioral approaches for treating phobias?

  • Systematic desensitization
  • Flooding
• Three steps to Systematic desensitization:

  • Create anxiety hierarchy
  • Relaxation techniques
  • Gradual exposure
• What is flooding?

  A method where they are directly exposed to their phobic stimulus and are prevented from escaping the situation

  They have to naturally come down (anxiety)

  Based on the principle of extinction
• • After flooding the body will become exhausted as fear is a time limited response and will eventually become calm
  • Their body will come to terms with that their phobia means no harm so their panic response becomes tired
• What is depression?

  A mental health disorder characterized by persistent feelings of sadness, hopelessness, and a loss of interest in activities.
• What are the behavioral characteristics of depression?

  • Low activity levels - reduced energy levels, lethargic, often results in withdrawal from work/school
  • Disruption to sleeping and eating - increased sleep (hypersomnia) or lack of sleep (insomnia). Appetite might also increace (weight gain) or decreace (weight loss)
• What are the emotional characteristics of depression?

  • Low mood - linked to feeling sad/unhappy aswell as worthlessness and emptiness
  • Anger - sufferers may also frequently experience anger towards themselves or others which can lead to aggressive or self harming behaviors
• What are the cognitive characteristics of depression?

  • Poor concentration - sufferers find themselves unable to completely focus on a task or find it hard to make straightforward decisions.
  • Dwell on the negative - people with depression tend to pay more attention to the negative aspects of a situation and ignore the positives. They are also more likely to recall unhappy events that happy ones
• Cognitive explanations for depression:

  • Suggests depression is caused by the way people think
  • Two main explanations:
  • Beck's cognitive theory
  • Ellis' ABC model
• Becks cognitive theory two parts:

  • Faulty thought processing
  • Negative self schemas
• Faulty thought processing - believed that people with depression have errors or faulty thought processing such as...

  • Over generalization
  • Catastrophic thinking
  • Negative thinking
• • Negative self schemas are often developed in childhood and may come from negative experiences e.g criticism from parents
  • These impact the way they think and see themselves and the world around them
  • These negative self schemas interpret information about themselves in a negative way which could lead to faulty thought processes
• What is OCD?


  A common mental health condition in which a person experiences obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaivours
• What are obsessions in OCD?

  Unwanted thoughts that a person has about something (internal component of disorder)
• What are compulsions in OCD?

  Repeated behaviours that a person is compelled to do triggered by the obsessions (external component of disorder)
• What are the behavioural characteristics of OCD?

  • Compulsions/repetitive actions
  • Avoidance on anxiety inducing situations
• What are the emotional characteristics of OCD?

  • Anxiety and stress
  • Low mood due to anxiety
• What are the cognitive characteristics of OCD?

  • Catastrophic thinking - worst case scenario
  • Hypervigilance - extreme awareness of risks and hazards around them
• OCD sufferers are aware of their condition and know that these thoughts and behaviours are irrational
• What are the definitions for abnormality?

  • Statistical infrequency
  • Deviation from social norms
  • Failure to function adequately
  • Deviation from ideal mental health
• Statistical infrequency:

  • Uses bell curve distribution to determine what is abnormal
  • Assesses how frequent the behavior/thought/feeling is compared to the general population
  • Those behaviors etc. that are statistically infrequent and on the top end or bottom end of the bell cure would be classed as statistically infrequent
• Statistical infrequency evaluation:

  Strengths - Useful real life applications to diagnose intellectual disabilities such as using and IQ test

  Limitations - Not all abnormal behaviors are infrequent e.g depression, 1 in 4 people have it so it isn't infrequent

  -Context - some people may show one of these behaviors but may be relevant to there job, such as a doctor washing their hands alot
• Deviation from social norms:

  • Abnormality can be seen when people behave different to what people/society expects from them
  • Social norms are unwritten rules or expectations from society
  • When people break or do not follow social norms then it might be a sign of abnormality
• Deviation from social norms evaluation:

  Strengths - Its more realistic as it accounts for social context and not just looks as statistical differences

  Limitations - Diagnosis is based on western social norms meaning there might be an increased rate of diagnosis in ethnic minorities as they may see some of these behaviors as normal

  -Subjective to what constitutes the norm - some people see things as abnormal where as some people just see it as eccentric
• Failure to function adequately:

  • Behavior may be seen as abnormal when the individual is unable to cope with everyday tasks as a result of their behavior
  • This also considers the level of distress caused to themselves and their family and friends as a result of their behavior
  • Functioning adequately can be assessed using the global assessment of functioning scale (GAF)
  • If someone is depressed and cant go to work it would be classed as failure to function
• Failure to function evaluation:

  Strengths - this approach considers the patients day to day activities, personal issues, experiences and problems individually therefore helps us assess who actually needs treatment and so takes an idiographic approach

  Limitations - It is very subjective, one person may feel the patient is functioning adequately whereas another may feel the patient isn't functioning adequately
• Traits of ideal mental health:

  • Jahoda proposed six characteristics that need to be met to demonstrate "ideal mental health"
  • These include: Positive attitude, self actualisation, autonomy, resist stress, accurate perception of reality and showing environmental mastery