Abnormal Behavior

• catatonic

  act of staying in a fixed stuporous state for long periods
• delusion

  irrational belief involving a misinterpretation of perceptions or life experiences
• flat affect

  lack of variety in emotional expression and speech
• hallucination

  sensory experience a person believes to be true when actually it is not
• inappropriate affect

  emotion that is unsuitable for a given situation
• negative symptom

  feature that represents a significant deficit in behavior
• positive symptom

  feature that is obvious and excessive and usually not present in healthy individuals
• psychotic disorder

  class of serious mental illnesses marked by a disconnect from reality
• schizophrenia

  disorder marked by positive symptoms, such as delusions, negative symptoms, and disorganized behavior
• disorganized speech

  communication that is disconnected, fragmented, interrupted and/or jumbled
• alogia

  state of speaking very little to other people
• anhedonia

  lack of pleasure or interest in life activities
• avolition

  inability or unwillingness to engage in goal-directed activities
• catatonic behavior

  display of unusual motor symptoms
• prodromal phase

  initial phase of schizophrenia marked by peculiar thoughts and behaviors without active psychotic features
• psychotic prephase

  phase of schizophrenia between prodromal and active phases involving the onset of first positive symptom of schizophrenia
• active phase

  phase of schizophrenia marked by full-blown psychotic features such as delusions and hallucinations
• residual phase

  phase of schizophrenia usually after the active phase involving peculiar thoughts and behaviors
• schizophreniform disorder

  mental illness marked by symptoms of psychosis that last 1 to 6 months
• delusional disorder

  mental illness marked by one or more hallucinations without other features of schizophrenia
• schizoaffective disorder

  mental illness marked by psychosis and irrational beliefs, and depression or mania
• brief psychotic disorder

  mental illness marked by hallucinations and irrational beliefs lasting 1 day to 1 month
• postpartum psychosis

  mental illness marked by psychotic symptoms in a mother following the birth of her child
• neurodevelopmental hypothesis

  model that assumes early brain changes and gradual changes over life progress to full-blown symptoms
• theory of mind

  state of understanding the thoughts and beliefs of others
• atypical antipsychotic

  newer class of drugs that impact dopamine receptors and other neurotransmitter systems such as serotonin
• typical antipsychotic

  older class of drugs that works by reducing excess levels of dopamine in the brain
• extrapyramidal effect

  unwanted byproduct from certain drugs involving involuntary movements of different parts of the body
• milieu therapy

  treatment approach involving the encouragement of a patient to engage in prosocial and therapeutic activities
• developmental disorder

  diagnosis marked by delay in key areas of cognitive, daily life, and academic functioning
• limited developmental disorder

  diagnosis in which one area but not many areas of functioning are affected
• pervasive developmental disorder

  diagnosis in which many areas of functioning are affected
• adaptive functioning

  ability to carry out daily tasks that allows a person to be independent
• intellectual developmental disorder

  pervasive developmental disorder marked by intelligence and adaptive behavior problems, and onset before age 18 years
• autism spectrum disorder

  diagnosis associated with impairment in social interactions, impaired communication and bizarre behavior patterns
• learning disorder

  diagnosis marked by academic problems in reading, spelling, writing, arithmetic, or some other important area
• fragile X syndrome


  condition that involves damage to the FMR1 gene and occurs most often in males
• phenylketonuria (PKU)

  autosomal recessive disorder that leads to buildup of phenylalanine
• sickle cell disease

  genetic condition involving damaged red blood cells and poor oxygenation of cells
• Tay-Sachs Disease

  genetic condition found in Ashkenazi Jews, involving severe motor and sensory disabilities and early death