General Psychology Exam 4

• What is a psychological disorder?

  • Psychological Disorder: an ongoing dysfunctional pattern of thought, emotion and behavior that causes significant distress, and that is considered deviant in that person's culture
  • 3Ds: Dysfunction, Distress, Deviant
  • Diagnosis is based on observation and questioning
  • No physical equipment to detect disorder
• What is a psychological disorder?

  • Emotions, thoughts, & behaviors exist on a continuum:
  • Ranging from:
  • Common accepted, typical level
  • Deviant, unaccepted, extreme level
  • Everyday emotions, thoughts & behaviors associated with disorders:
  • Is normal, but disorder indicates too much of it
  • Washing hands
  • OCD, Sam
  • Concern over appearance
  • Anorexia
  • Fear of Spiders
  • Phobia
• What is a psychological disorder?

  • Emotions, thoughts, & behaviors exist on a continuum:
  • Ranging from:
  • Common accepted, typical level
  • Deviant, unaccepted, extreme level
  • Everyday emotions, thoughts & behaviors associated with disorders:
  • Is normal, but disorder indicates too much of it
  • Washing hands
  • OCD, Sam
  • Concern over appearance
  • Anorexia
  • Fear of Spiders
  • Phobia
  • Just behaviors is not enough to diagnose
• What is a psychological disorder?

  • Does the unusual / deviant emotion, thought or behavior cause distress and/or dysfunction?
  • Distress: pain, suffering, mental anguish
  • Extreme anxiety over something and can't calm down
  • Dysfunction: impaired ability to take care of self and responsibility
  • Not doing needed things because of distress
  • Not functioning properly
• Psychodiagnosis: The DSM

  • Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders
  • First Edition published 1952
  • Mental health professional at the time, collected all they knew about disorders
  • Now, DSM-5 (2013)
  • Major revisions
  • Provides standard criteria or guidelines for diagnosing over 400 disorders
• Stigma and Psychological Disorders:

  • Stigma: a disgrace or defect that indicates a person belongs to a culturally devalued group
  • Disrespectful labels: crazy, nuts
  • Discrimination in employment, education, & places of worship
  • Stereotypes of the mentally ill as "dangerous"
  • Not unheard of for mentally ill to harm others/self
  • Those who are undiagnosed are most likely to be violent
  • Likely to be harmed; stereotypes themselves
  • Stigma deters people from seeking help and slows recovery
  • Wait 10 yrs before getting help
  • Will get better faster with support, but deteriorate faster without support
• Stigma and Psychological Disorders:

  • Mental illness is not a "flaw" any more than Cancer
  • Both are mental and physical illnesses
  • are out of person's control
  • can be treated with drugs
  • are covered by health insurance
  • have biological and environmental causes
  • People often think that physical illness is only biological, and mental is not
  • Half of population have Psychological Disorders
• 46% of population will be diagnosed with any psychological disorder in their lifetime
• Mood Disorders

  • A class of disorders involving a significant & long term change in mood
  • 21% lifetime prevalence (BF pandemic)
  • Broad Category
  • Seasonal Affective Disorder: depression caused by change in season
  • Perinatal Depression: happens before or after birth, due to hormones
  • Study found that even though mental health was self-reported as good, in 2023, 37% were diagnosed with a disorder
• Mood Disorders:

  • Major Depressive Disorder
  • Persistent Depressive Disorder (dysthymia)
  • Bipolar Disorder (Manic Depressive)
  • Bipolar I
  • Bipolar II
  • Cyclothymia
• Major Depressive Disorder

  • extreme & persistent feelings of sadness, worthlessness & hopelessness
  • Emotional Component:
  • 2weeks of: depressed mood &/or anhedonia, + at least 3 other symptoms for 5+ total
  • Feeling sad, not able to feel happy
  • Physical Component:
  • Weight, appetite, sleep problems, psychomotor, retardation, fatigue
  • Cognitive Component:
  • Excessive/inappropriate guilt, worthlessness, suicide stuff
• Persistent Depressive Disorder (dysthymia)

  • Less severe, but chronic
  • Two years of depression most of the time plus at least two other common symptoms
  • Can have a let up of symptoms but then back to normal symptoms
  • Person is less dysfunctional, and therefore able to function
• Bipolar Disorder:

  • Periods of debilitating depression alternating with periods of extreme euphoria and energy (2.6% annually)
  • Mania:
  • Abnormally elevated mood
  • Grandiosity
  • increase in goal directed behavior
  • Little sleep
  • Racing speech & thoughts & distractability
  • Impulsive risky behavior
• Psychologists suggest that instead of searching for hidden causes of emotional problems (as in Freud's psychodynamic psychotherapy) therapists should do what?

  • help develop skills to deal with it

  What is a phobia?

  • irrational fear, more intense than it ought to be, something that is not really of danger
  • fight or flight
• What is the focus of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

  • Phobias
  • Identifying and changing thoughts, challenge thoughts

  How is reappraisal used in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for phobias?

  • Letting anxious thoughts not be pushed away, but examine them
  • Put thoughts in perspectives
• What is the behavioral component of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy?

  • Do the things we're afraid of, exposure therapy
  • Do a behavior that alters emotional part of brain

  What is PTSD, and what are the general symptoms associated with PTSD?

  • Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
  • Nightmares, substance abuse, deterioration of social life, suicidal ideations, feelings, dysfunction in multiple areas
  • Reliving traumatic experience long after it occurred
• How do hormones influence the development of PTSD?

  • Emotional events lead to memory trace
  • Stress hormones: adrenaline, cortisol
  • Help burn traumatic experience into memory

  How is Cognitive Behavior Therapy (esp. Prolonged Exposure Therapy) used with PTSD sufferers?

  • Embrace & relive memory until fear about them is diminished
  • Changing & learning about memory that invokes fear
  • Imagine & visualize memory & senses & feelings associated
• At what age does OCD appear?

  • 8 - 12

  What ratio of children are affected by OCD?

  • 1 in 200
• Describe some of the worries or fears the children had and the behaviors the children felt like they had to do (including avoidant behaviors) because of the worry or fear?

  • Sickness/poisoned: avoided gum wrappers, litter, dying plants, sick people, trees because there was a bottle next to one one time
  • Specific Rituals to make bad events go away
• What is an obsession?

  • Something scared of

  What is a compulsion?

  • Something have to do to avoid the fear

  What is a hierarchies?

  • Things that are giving trouble ranked

  What are exposures?

  • Challenges that work up to do
  • Expose self to thing fearful of

  What are some of the exposures the kids had to perform?

  • Sitting next to tree, Hug or touch body builder, have parents not repeat
• Bipolar Disorders

  • Bipolar I:
  • manic episodes for 7 + days
  • depressive episodes for 2 + weeks
  • Bipolar II:
  • hypomanic and depressive episodes
  • Cyclothmia:
  • frequent periods of hypomania symptoms and depressive symptoms
• Causes of Major Depressive Disorder

  • Cognitive Perspective:
  • how a person processes information contributes to disorders
  • Pessimistic Attribution Style for negative events
  • 3 Characteristics of Pessimistic Attribution Styles:
  • Internal Attribution: "Its my fault,"
  • Stable Attribution: "I'll never get another job," sees it as permanent
  • Global Attribution: "My entire life is ruined," affecting all aspects of life
  • Seligman Attribution Style: particular way of explaining events in life
• • Seligman Attribution Style: particular way of explaining events in life
  • Optimistic: Good way of looking at things, external, unstable attribute, quarantining the bad
  • Pessimistic: Bad way of looking at things, internal, stable, global
  • Seligman Attribution Style Study:
  • Longitudinal study that measured attribution style & depression
  • Measured at beginning of school, then measured towards end of school
  • Found that Pessimistic attribution style comes before the actual depression
• Causes of Bipolar Disorder

  • Biological factors and bipolar disorder:
  • Genes (risk, not guarantee)
  • 85% Concordance rate among identical twins
  • Indicates that there are genes that are major in causing bipolar disorder
  • Neurotransmitters:
  • Low serotonin, high norepinephrine & unstable glutamate
  • Glutamate: involved in learning, making right kind of connections, too high (manic), too low (depression)
• Causes of Bipolar Disorder

  • Sociocultural Perspective:
  • Social and cultural factors contribute to disorders
  • Prevalence of BD is lower in cultures with high seafood consumption
  • Omega 3 fatty acids
  • Giving it doesn't help someone who is already Bipolar
  • Ingesting is a preventative measure
  • Not a linear relation, is a curve linear
• Causes of MDD and BD

  • Behavioral, Cognitive and Sociocultural Perspectives:
  • Behavioral & Cognitive: learned behavior
  • Major life events/stressors early in life makes people more susceptible
  • Changes view & how process information
  • Learned Helplessness: "Nothing I do makes it go away"
  • Stressors in adulthood trigger mood disorders
  • Linked to high rates of depression
  • Things good in childhood, but stressors in adulthood
• Causes of Disorders

  • Biopsychosocial approach: the view that a combination of biological, psychological, and social factors contribute to mental health (or illness)
  • Biological: genetic component, neurotransmitters
  • Psychological: coping skills
  • Social: culture (discrimination), socioeconomic stressors
• Causes of Major Depressive Disorder

  • Twin studies, 40% concordance rate
  • Concordance: % of pairs of individuals who share a trait (e.g. disorder)
  • means that genes are contributing to disorder
  • Neurotransmitters: chemicals neurons use to communicate with one another
  • Low levels of serotonin & norepinephrine
  • Serotonin: inhibitory, helps regulate mood, sleep, appetite, can allow particular mood or stop it
  • Norepinephrine: adrenaline, increase in brain activity, general arousal
• Causes of Major Depressive Disorder

  • Biological Perspective:
  • Which genes influence mood disorders?
  • Serotonin transporter gene influences reuptake of serotonin
  • 2 forms "long" & "short"
  • People with short version are more likely to have MDD
  • Long&Long: less likely to have MDD
  • Long&Short: mid likely to have MDD
  • Short&Short: more likely to have MDD
  • Not 100% determining
  • Reuptake: reabsorption of NTs
• Causes of Mood Disorders:

  • Diathesis Stress Model: disorders are due to the interaction between a person's genes & stressful life events
  • Questionaire of stressful life events & test their gene combination
  • Short & short neuron too short the NTs can't reach & bind
  • disorders are due to multiple factors, biopsychosocial factors
• Causes of Bipolar Disorder:

  • Unstable glutamate causes not right connections to be made
  • Lithium treatment: brings glutamate stable, somewhat toxic
  • Study of Lithium in water, measure Lithium levels in water
  • Found that places where Lithium is higher in water, found lower suicide rates
• Anxiety Disorders:

  • A class of disorders involving irrational, disruptive &/or uncontrollable anxiety.
  • Common 18%; 30% lifetime
  • Pre pandemic
  • No clear danger, can't cope
• Anxiety Disorders:

  • Generalized Anxiety Disorder: experiencing excessive anxiety for 6+ months; not tied to a specific threat (3.1% annually)
  • Always present, chronic
  • Nothing of real concern, generalized
  • "free floating anxiety," anxiety that follows them around
  • Specific Phobia: irrational fear of specific objects or situations that pose no real danger (8.7%)
  • Arachnophobia, dogs, heights
  • Social (Phobia) Anxiety Disorder: an intense and persistent fear of being watched & judged by others (7%)
  • Panic Disorder: sudden, unexpected & recurrent attacks of overwhelming anxiety (2.7%)
• Social Anxiety Disorder:

  • afraid of talking to friends, on a date, talking in class causes discomfort
  • 92% of people with SAD report being bullied as a child
• Panic Disorder:

  • Sudden, unexpected & recurrent attacks of overwhelming anxiety (2.7%)
  • Physical signs of panic: racing heart, sweating, difficulty breathing, hyper-ventillating, etc.
  • 1/3 develop agoraphobia
  • Fear of public places
  • scared of having panic attack in public spaces
  • Diagnosed with 2+ disorders, called comorbid
• Obsessive Compulsive & related Disorders

  • OCD: persistent, uncontrollable intrusions of unwanted thoughts and urges to engage in senseless rituals (1%)
  • Unwanted thoughts: Obsessive
  • Senseless rituals: Compulsion
  • was apart of anxiety group
  • Now has its own group
  • 2 part disorder: obsession & compulsion
• Obsession:

  • anxiety producing thoughts
  • inflicting harm on someone (don't want to do)
  • suicide (don't want to do)
  • symmetry/balance (perfectionism)
  • task incompletion (questioning if did something)
  • germs/contamination (touch something that might be germy, infected by bodybuilders)
  • "I made it happen because I had thoughts about it."
• Compulsions:

  • rituals that relieve anxiety
  • Ordering (arranging environment in particular way)
  • Endless "checking" (related to task incompletion)
  • Repetitive cleaning
  • Hand washing
  • Hierarchy: list of behaviors that are challenging for that person
  • Exposure: engaging in the behavior
• Comorbidity:

  • the simultaneous presence of two or more diseases or medical conditions in a patient
• Causes of Anxiety Disorders & OCD

  • Biological Perspective (NTs & genes)
  • For any anxiety disorder:
  • Identical twins 35% concordance rate
  • Likely to have low levels with GABA (main inhibitory NTs in nervous system)
  • GABA causes feelings of relaxation
  • For OCD:
  • Identical twins 63-87%
  • Low serotonin in the prefrontal cortex & caudate nucleus
  • Serotonin inhibitory, inhibits certain thoughts
  • Prefrontal: involved with logical thinking, most related to obsessions
  • Caudate: initiates actions, "go" signal, linked to compulsions