Psychopathology

Created by

Katie-May H

Cards (39)

Statistical Infrequency: Has practical use
- forms part of clinical assesments of mental disorders indicating the severity compared to a stat norm
- Informs clinicians about type and level of treatment required for effectiveness
Statistical Infrequency: Doesnt distinguish between desirable and undesirable behaviours or characteristics 
- serious limitaion as it means SI can never be used soley to make a diagnosis
Statistical Infrequency - Issue
- May be defined statistically abnormal but if that individual is not distressed by their condition a label is created
- Create unwarrented and unneeded attention
- Negative label could also create further mental health issues
Definition of Abnormality: Faliure to function adequately: Advantage 
- easy to judge certain behavioyrs listed, eg attending school or dressing themselves
- advantage as early intervention in identifying abnormality can help the person suffering and treatment can be put in place
Definition of Abnormality: Faliure to function adequately: Issue with who should decide whether they are failing to function 
- judgements may differ between observer and the person.
- unbale to decide which judgement is most valid.
- could create false labels
- raises the socially sensitive nature of the FFA definition
Definition of Abnormality: Faliure to function adequately: issue assesing whether behaviour is adaptive or maladaptive 
- problem as behaviours labelled as maladaptive by the FFA definition maybe functional and adaptive for that person
- EG someone with an eating disorder may result in extra attention for that person which could be viewed as an adaptive outcome for that person which aids their functioning
- raises thhe problem of decciding who should be the judge of whether a person is FFA and is in need of professional support
Defintion of Abnormality: Deviation from social norms: does not account for the context of the behaviour 
- issue as sometimes a beach outfit is normal but in different more formal contexts its not and would be considered abnormal.
- deviations from social norms does not account for contextual variations and is incomplete
Defintion of Abnormality: Devitation from social norms: doesnt account for the degree of extent to which a certain behaviour is displayed. 
- problem as not clear when a behaviour moves from eccentric to signs of excessive pathological behaviour
- EG being rude is deviant bbut when does it become abnormal
- Definition is incomplete because it doesnt consider the degree or extent behaviour has to be before its abnormal
Definition of Abnormality: deviations from social norms: unaable to offer a universal definiton of abnormality 
- social norms of behaviour vary between and within cultures
- will influence which behaviours are viewed as normal or abnormal within that culture froup
- Suggests that the definition is limited to the cultural group understudy
- making universal definitons of abnormality based on social norms very limited
Deviation from ideal mental health: adopts a positive approach to defining behaviour 
- rather than aiming for an absence of psychological traits it aims to suggest behaviours which may be desirable with an optimistic attitude to human behaviour and experience
- Suggests that DFIMH may be more appropriate than other more negative approaches to definining abnormality
Deviation from ideal mental health: allows therapists to focus positivley on behaviours to develop 
- allows them to not focus as much on ngeative behaviours
- specific areas for a therapist to focus to aim to improve the patients percieved behaviour if diagnosed with abnormality
- Clients may also find therapies based on DFIMH a more positive experience encouraging their attendance
Deviation from ideal mental health: Unrealistic 
- Criteria is so demanding that most people would be defined as abnormal
- limits the practical usefullness of the definition
- Also not clear how many criteria patients need to be lacking in before judgement is made
- questions validity and usefullness of DIMH
Systematic Desensitisation: support from OST
- supports the long time effectiveness of SD as treatment
- in one session with clients moving through the heirachy 90% were much more imporved or completley improved when seen 4 yrs later
- However may not have been a single session that saw these outcomes
Systematic Desensitisation: Problem with relapse with SD
- BARLOW AND CRASKE found 60-80% effectiveness rating for treating one of the most difficult phobias to treat
- raises concerns whether the underlying cause of the phobia has been tackled by SD
- prehaps a more psychodynamic approach is more appropriate
Systematic Desensitisation: ethically appropriate when compared to other therapies
- SD patients are fully aware of the situations that they will be placed in
- Clients are also in control of stopping the sessions if they feel to much stress
- ethical advantages makes SD a highly appropriate treatment for clients
Flooding: less effective for more complex phobias that have a cognitive element 
- most effective when can identify a particular object or situation as the source of the phobia
- EG easy to treat arachnophobia quickly and easily with flooding but not a social phobia where source cant be identified
- implies that the appropriatness and effectiveness of floofing is limited
Flooding: highly traumatic procedure 
- EG prospect of coming into contact with phobia cause extreme anxiety.
- individuals have t be highly motivated
- has high drop out rates as a result
- reduces the effectiveness pf the therapy and can sometimes worsen the phobia
- Effort required by clients raises concerns about appropriatness and effectiveness
Flooding: SHIPLEY AND BOUDEWYNS support its use
- Carried out a survey of therapsits using flooding to investigate the common view that flooding may produce serious negative side effects.
- 0.2 % of clients experienced side effects, most being brief panic reactions.
- Concluded that flooding produced the same or fewer side effects to compared to other therapies making it a safe, effective and appropriate treatment for the majority of clients
Behavioural Explanations of phobias: research only offers partial support
- OST and HUGDAHL suggest phobias cannot be explained by using CC and OC
- Found that nearly half of all people with phobias have never had an anxious experience with their phobia
- Study undermines importance of association and repetition outlined
Behavioural Explanations of phobias: RACHMAN found no support for it in real life situations 
- EG traumatic events of WW2 and the exposure of civillians to air raids in times of war failed to reveal any phobic reactions
- Undermines external validity of any supporting research, suggesting behavioural approach may only be relevant in more controlled artificial conditions
Behavioural Explanations of phobias: evolutionary theory points to a weakness in BEOF 
- evidence indicates people have a predisposition to developing certain types of phobias which is not accounted for with the BEOF
- highlights limitation in behavioural model
- EG SELIGMAN found it easier to condition people into a phobia of snakes or spider over flowers.
- Implies that a behavioural explanation is incomplete and not all phobias develop in the same way
Genetic Explanations of OCD: Menzies research gives support and validity
- Used MRI to see brain activity in OCD patients and immediate family members without OCD and a group do unrelated healthy people.
- Found that OCD patients and relatives had reduced grey matter in key regions of brain, including the OFC
- Supports view that anatomical differences are inherited and may lead to OCD in certain individuals.
- Brain scans can be used in the future to detect OCD
Genetic Explanations of OCD: Concordance rate of twins found in various studies are never 100%, means environmental factors must play a role in OCD 
- Further analysis from Cromer found that half the OCD in sample had a traumatic event in their past
- OCD was more severe in those with more than one trauma
- OCD cannot be entirely genetic in origin
Genetic Explanations of OCD: psychologists have found it difficult to pin down all the genes involved in OCD 
- So many potential candidate genes the usefulness of a genetic explanation is reduced.
- Albucher et al suggests it is more useful to focus on the psychological causes of OCD because they offer predictive validity of how associations, conditioning or cognitions will create OCD behaviours
- Questions the practical benefits of real world application of genetic explanations to OCD
Neural Explanations of OCD: Supporting evidence from the influence of drugs on OCD
- Shown by the influence of antidepressants on serotonin in reducing OCD behaviours, validating the role serotonin in OCD.
- Offers validity to neural processes and OCD suggesting serotonin must be involved in some way
Neural Explanations of OCD: Problem with approach
- Neural Approach is reductionist
- A complex multi-dimensional problem like OCD as shown in various multi-dimensional models cant be reduced to a simple chemical imbalance
Neural Explanations of OCD: Issue of co-morbidity
- Depression often co-exists with OCD
- Abnormal levels of serotonin are associated with depression
- Cannot be confident that OCD has emerged due to abnormal levels of serotonin as levels may be due to depression
- Cannot be sure these serotonin levels would exists without depression
- Highlights the difficulty in establishing the validity of claims by neural explanations of OCD
Drug Therapies OCD: Evidence for effectiveness
- Soomro et al reviewed studies of use of SSRI's with OCD patients
- Found them to be more effective than placebos in reducing symptoms of OCD up to 3 months after treatment.
Drug Therapies: Research questions long term effectivness of drug therapy
- Studies only 3 to 4 months duration
- Koran et al in a review of treatments for OCD suggested that even though drug therapies are more commonly used, CBT should be tried first
Drug Therapies: Further problems highlighted by Maina et al
- Patients relapse within a few weeks of stopping medication for OCD
- Suggests it doesnt offer a lasting cure only treating the symptoms
- Suggest other therapies like CBT or SD are more appropriate and effective
Drug Therapies for OCD: Destructive side effects of the drug 
- Results inpatients questionning whether drug treatments are appropriate for them
- Can create other more extreme problems
- EG problem with SSRI'sin treating OCD is that side effect can cause nausea, headaches and insomnia
- Makes people not want to take the drugs
Beck's Explanation of Depression: Supporting research from Grazioli 
- studied 65 pregnant woman
- Cognitive vulnerability score, faulty information processing, negative self-statements and negative triad was a good predictor of the likelihood of post-natal depression.
Beck's Explanation of Depression: Clark and Beck research support 
- review of literature and found that signs of cognitive vulnerability before depression were evident
- suggesting that beck's theory offers a valid insight to explaining the causes of depression.
- Research findings imply that the link between faulty cognition's and depression is not simply correlational but casual, giving the work of Ellis and Becks predictive validity
Ellis' Explanation of Depression: Empirical support from Gustafson. 
- found that maladapted thinking processes were displayed by many people with psychological disorders
- Roth found that depressed clients perceive and recall more negative thoughts compared to a control group
- Findings give validity to Ellis' and his explanation of depression and its treatment implications
Ellis' Explanation of depression: Only explains one type of depression
- limited explanation
- problem because not all depressive episodes can be explained by a response to an activating event
- evidence suggests that for many people depression is associated with issues of anger and hallucinations
- highlights limited scope of ABC explanation
Becks and Ellis' explanations of Depression - allows for individual differences in the development of depression
- irrational thoughts account for individual differences
- hence why one person may develop depression due to divorce whilst another many perceive it as an opportunity
- implies CEFD is more appropriate than behavioural approaches as its explanation leads to a more insightful diagnosis of an individuals depressions and result in more valid treatment
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy: Effective
- Large body of evidence to support effectiveness
- March et al compared effectiveness of CBT, antidepressant drugs and a combination of the 2. 327 adolescents with depression
- After 36 weeks, 81% CBT, 81% antidepressant and 86% both improved
- CBT emerged as just as effective as drugs
- good case for making CBT first choice of treatment in NHS
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy: May not work for most severe cases
- depression so severe can't motivate themselves to engage with CBT
- possible to treat with antidepressant drugs and commence CBT when patient more motivated
- limitation as means CBT can not be used as sole treatment for all cases
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy: Success may be due to the therapist - patient relationship 
- Rosenzwig suggested differences between CBT and SD are quite small
- Quality of patient-therapist relation is most likely what determines the success of the treatment rather than the technique
- Many comparative reviews find very small differences
- Supports the view that simply having an opportunity to talk to someone who is willing to listen matters the most