paper 1 psychopathology

• Abnormality


  Psychologists need a scientific method to determine if someone has a mental disorder
• Definitions of abnormality


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

  • Normal is based on how others expect us to behave
  • Every society has accepted standard of behaviour
  • Abnormality is when a behaviour does not fit within what is socially acceptable
  • Behaviour that goes against the social norms
• Eating in a fancy restaurant with your hands goes against social norms
• Deviation from social norms


  • Strength: Takes into account the social dimensions, as the same behaviour could be normal in one context but abnormal in another
  • Weakness: Lack of temporal validity as social norms change over time
  • Weakness: Can't be used as a universal definition as social norms vary across cultures
• Statistical infrequency


  • Strength: Objective measure of abnormality that doesn't rely on interpretation of behaviour
  • Weakness: Fails to account for statistically rare but desirable behaviours
  • Weakness: Some disorders are not statistically rare but still require help
• Failure to function adequately


  • Strength: Observable as it can be seen by others around the individual
  • Weakness: Many mental disorders do not cause personal distress
  • Weakness: Cultural relativism as some cultures may consider certain behaviours as normal
• Deviation from ideal mental health

  • Strength: Focuses on what is helpful and desirable for the individual
  • Weakness: Criteria are too demanding, most people would be judged abnormal
  • Weakness: Criteria reflect Western cultural norms, can't be generalised to other cultures
• Phobia


  A fear that is disproportionate to the actual danger, leads to avoidance, and is disruptive to everyday life
• Behavioural characteristics of phobias

  • Avoidance of feared objects
  • Freezing
• Emotional characteristics of phobias

  • Fear
  • Anxiety
  • Panic
• Cognitive characteristics of phobias

  • Irrational thinking
  • Selective attention
• Behavioural explanation of phobias (Two-process model)

  1. Acquisition of phobias by classical conditioning

  2. Maintenance by operant conditioning
• Evidence for the behavioural explanation of phobias comes from the Watson and Raynor study on Little Albert
• The behavioural approach cannot explain why some phobias are more common, as the biological preparedness theory suggests we are born with a predisposition to develop certain fears
• The behavioural explanation has been used to develop effective treatments for phobias, such as systematic desensitisation and flooding
• The behavioural explanation has been criticised for being reductionist and overly simplistic, as it doesn't take into account the role of cognition in the formation of phobias
• Systematic desensitisation


  1. Patient is taught relaxation techniques

  2. Patient creates a fear hierarchy

  3. Gradual exposure to feared stimuli while practising relaxation
• Flooding


  Patient is immediately exposed to the most frightening situation, unable to avoid the phobic stimulus
• Systematic desensitisation and flooding work better for simple phobias, not complex phobias like social phobias or generalised anxiety disorders
• Depression


  A mood disorder
• Cognitive characteristics of depression


  • Suicidal thoughts
  • Negative or irrational thinking
  • Lowered self esteem
• Behavioural characteristics of depression

  • Decrease in sexual activity
  • Change in eating behaviour
  • Change in sleeping behaviour
• Emotional characteristics of depression

  • Low mood
  • Sadness
  • Anger
  • Anxiety
• Cognitive explanation of depression

  Assumes depression is the result of faulty thinking or maladaptive cognitive processes
• Beck's cognitive triad


  • Negative view about the world
  • Negative view about themselves
  • Negative view about the future
• Negative self-schemas


  Childhood negative schemas develop, providing a negative framework for viewing events pessimistically
• Overgeneralisation


  Holding extreme beliefs on the basis of a single incident and applying it to different or dissimilar situations
• Ellis ABC Model


  1. Activating event

  2. Belief

  3. Consequences
• they do not have the expectation that they will feel better by doing them
• Beck's cognitive triad


  A person becomes depressed as they view life events through three cognitive biases: negative view about the world, themselves, and the future
• Schemas


  Sets of internal assumptions that guide our behaviour
• Overgeneralisation


  People hold extreme beliefs on the basis of a single incident and apply it to different or dissimilar and inappropriate situations
• A - Activating event


  The adversity of event to which there is a reaction
• B - Belief


  The belief or explanation about why the situation occurred
• C - Consequences


  The feelings and behaviour the belief now causes
• The external event is 'blamed' for the unhappiness being experienced
• Grazioli and Terry (2000)


  • Assessed 65 pregnant women for cognitive vulnerability and depression before and after birth, found those with higher cognitive vulnerability were more likely to suffer post-natal depression
• Depressed people undoubtedly have negative thoughts, but we can question do the negative thoughts help cause depression or are the negative thought merely as a result of being depressed
• Cognitive explanation of depression

  • Has led to therapy - cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT)
  • CBT has been found to be a very effective therapy and is prescribed on the NHS