psych psychopathology

• Behaviors associated with mental health issues

  • Phobias
  • Depression
  • Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
• Cognitive approach


  Explaining and healing actions
• Classical and operant conditioning

  Methods of learning
• The biological approach in treating OCD includes genetic and neural explanations
• Four definitions of abnormality
• Statistical infrequency
• Any relatively usual behavior or characteristics can be thought of as normal and any unusual behavior is abnormal
• Intellectual disability requires an IQ of 70 or below
• A score of 30 in the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) indicates severe depression
• Deviation from social norms


  Behavior that is different from the accepted standards in a community or society
• Signs of antisocial personality disorder include failure to conform to culturally normal ethical behavior
• Schizotypical personality disorder


  Characterized by strange thinking, behavior, and appearance
• A person from one cultural group may view someone from another group as abnormal using that group's standards
• Judging behavior as abnormal can be difficult when considering different cultures and situations
• Inadequate functioning occurs when someone is unable to cope with ordinary demands of daily life
• Signs to determine when someone is not functioning adequately include severe personal changes and dangerous behavior
• Most people have symptoms of a mental disorder to some degree
• People seek professional help when they cease to function adequately
• It can be difficult to determine whether someone is truly abnormal or has chosen a different lifestyle
• High-risk leisure activities could be classified as abnormal and a danger to self
• Deviation from ideal mental health


  Occurs when someone does not meet criteria for good mental health
• Criteria for good mental health

  • Realistic self-perception
  • Rational thinking
  • Self-actualization
  • Coping with stress
  • Good self-esteem
  • Independence
  • Successful work, love, and relationships
• Most people experience stress at some point in their life
• Based on the definition, students experiencing exam stress would be considered abnormal
• Phobia


  An intense, persistent and irrational fear of an object, context, or activity
• Fear is atypical when people have an extreme reaction to a non-threatening or only mildly threatening situation
• Types of phobias

  • Specific phobias
  • Social phobia
  • Agoraphobia
• Characteristics of phobias

  • Behavioural characteristics: panic, avoidance, endurance
  • Emotional characteristics: anxiety, fear
  • Cognitive characteristics: selective attention, maladaptive beliefs
• Two process model


  Phobias are acquired by classical conditioning and maintained by operant conditioning
• We associate a neutral stimulus with something we are afraid of
• Little Albert's conditioning


  • Stimulus generalization: fear extended to other similar objects like a rabbit and Santa Claus mask
• If we are scared of something


  We avoid it, so our phobia persists
• Operant conditioning


  Learning through reinforcement
• Systematic desensitization


  A therapy used to treat phobias based on conditioning
• Phobias maintained by avoidance cease to be reinforced once avoidance is prevented
• Evolutionary factors


  Could play a role in phobias, acting as a survival mechanism - Bounton
• Biological preparedness


  Suggests phobias are inherited through evolution and adaptation following the survival of species
• Cognitive factors

  Phobias may develop as a consequence of irrational thinking
• The two process model does not completely explain symptoms of phobia
• Systematic desensitization


  Behavioral therapy designed to gradually reduce phobic anxiety through the principle of classical conditioning