1.4.2 Explanations of fear-related disorders

Question 1

Operant conditioning - Behavioural explanations

Famous example of operant conditioning for a fear

Answer 1

The case of Little Albert, who researchers conditioned to be scared of rats.

Question 2

Operant conditioning - Behavioural explanations

How can operant conditioning be used to cause a phobia?

Answer 2

When a harmless stimulus (a rat, for example), is paired with a fearful experience (such as a loud noise).

Question 3

Operant conditioning - Behavioural explanations

How may BII develop through vicarious reinforcement?

Answer 3

If a child sees a parent faint or become distressed during an injection, they might ‘learn’ the phobia from the role model.

Question 4

Operant conditioning - Behavioural explanations

Negative reinforcement

Answer 4

By removing ourselves from the unpleasant experience, we are increasing the likelihood of repeating the behaviour and keeping the phobia.

Question 5

Classical conditioning - Behavioural explanations

Classical conditioning

Answer 5

Learning by association.

When someone associates and unconditioned stimulus with a neutral stimulus.

After repeated associations, they respond to the neutral stimulus, which has now become the conditioned stimulus, without having the unconditioned stimulus present anymore.

Question 6

Classical conditioning - Behavioural explanations

How is a classical conditioned phobia continued?

Answer 6

Via operant conditioning.

Question 7

Behavioural explanations

Counter-conditioning

Answer 7

Could occur if we come across situations or objects that are not scary/hurtful.

So if our BII was due to a painful injection, a painless injection could extinguish the phobia.

Question 8

Freud (1909) - Psychodynamic/Behavioural explanations

Aim

Answer 8

To describe phobia development/recovery in a young child.

Question 9

Freud (1909) - Psychodynamic/Behavioural explanations

Who did the study involve?

Method?

Answer 9

A case study of a 5-year-old boy with a phobia of white horses.

Question 10

Freud (1909) - Psychodynamic/Behavioural explanations

Results

Answer 10

The horse phobia was a displacement of fear, Freud believed the horse symbolised the boy’s father and castration anxiety was placed on the horse who he thought might bite him.

Question 11

Freud (1909) - Psychodynamic/Behavioural explanations

What lead to the boy’s castration anxiety?

Answer 11

He would talk about his ‘widdler’ or penis often and his mum threaten to cut it off if he touched it.

Question 12

Freud (1909) - Psychodynamic/Behavioural explanations

What did the boy frequently dream of?

Answer 12

• Giraffes symbolising the oedipus complex.
• Being a mother to his own children.
• His mother showing him her ‘widdler’.
• A plumber taking away his ‘widdler’ and bottom and replacing them with larger ones.

Question 13

Freud (1909) - Psychodynamic/Behavioural explanations

Stages of psycho-sexual development

Answer 13

• Oral
• Anal
• Phallic
• Latent
• Genital

Question 14

Freud (1909) - Psychodynamic/Behavioural explanations

Conclusions

Answer 14

Phobias are a way of expressing unconscious fears and they can only be treated through reducing the unconscious fear.

Question 15

Freud (1909) - Psychodynamic/Behavioural explanations

What did Freud suggests anxiety/fear results from?

What does this mean?

Answer 15

Results from the impulses of the ID, usually when it’s being denied or repressed.

This would mean phobias are an internal conflict that can manifest in human behaviour.

Question 16

Biological/medical/genetic explanations

What do the biological explanations of phobias argue about their cause?

Answer 16

We may be pre-programmed to fear certain objects that are potentially harmful, this may be evolutionarily adaptive.

Question 17

Biological/medical/genetic explanations

What kind of phobias do the idea that phobias are evolutionarily adaptive explain?

Why?

Answer 17

Arachnophobia and ophidiophobia (fear of snakes), since these could be dangerous.

Question 18

Twin studies - Biological/medical/genetic explanations

What did Skre et al. learn about phobias in twins?

Answer 18

Specific phobias are shared by twins more often than non-identical ones.

Question 19

Biological/medical/genetic explanations

What did Cooke and Mineka (1989) learn about rhesus monkeys and phobias?

Answer 19

They showed videos of monkeys being scared by crocodile/snake toys, as well as flowers and rabbits.

It was found that the monkeys were only scared of the crocodile/snake toys. suggesting there could be a reason for this such as them being dangerous.

Question 20

Ost et al. (1991) - Biological/medical/genetic explanations

Aim

Answer 20

To determine whether blood phobics are similar enough to injection phobics to justify treating blood-injection as one phobia.

Question 21

Ost et al. (1991) - Biological/medical/genetic explanations

Method

Answer 21

Self-report data was gathered about phobia origins, family history, age of onset and fainting from people with blood, injection and other phobias.

Ppts watched a surgery video (blood phobics) or had a finger-prick test (injection phobics), whilst researchers recorded their anxiety and heart rate/blood pressure.

Question 22

Ost et al. (1991) - Biological/medical/genetic explanations

Results

Answer 22

Compared with injection phobics, blood phobics:
* had more first degree relatives with the same phobia
* were more fearful of fainting as a response.

Question 23

Ost et al. (1991) - Biological/medical/genetic explanations

Conclusions

Answer 23

Blood-injection phobia should remain as one diagnosis, since there are more similarities than differences between the 2 phobias.

Although, compared to injection phobia, blood phobia has a stronger genetic component and more severe biological reactions.

Question 24

Ost et al. (1991) - Biological/medical/genetic explanations

Applied tension therapy

Answer 24

For BIIP, patients could tense major muscle group to decrease vasovagal syncope when they were highly anxious.

This is supposed to increase vasovagal blood flow.

Question 25

Ost et al. (1991) - Biological/medical/genetic explanations

Strengths

Answer 25

• Internal validity = data was discounted from ppts who did not meet diagnosis criteria when re-assessed.
• Objective data = behavioural tests did not rely on subjective self-reports.

Question 26

Ost et al. (1991) - Biological/medical/genetic explanations

Criticisms

Answer 26

• Ecological validity = video of surgery is not the same as in real-life.
• Validity = primary data about relatives was not checked to see is the diagnosis was accurate.

Question 27

Cognitive explanations

What do cognitive psychologists focus on as the cause of phobias?

Answer 27

The thought and reasoning processes, seeing phobias as caused by the anxiety which is linked to the phobic being more likely to believe negative events are linked in turn to the phobic object.

They overexaggerate the negative consequences and underestimate their ability to cope.

Question 28

Dinardo et al. (1988) - Cognitive explanations

What did Dinardo et al. (1988) find about dog phobias?

Answer 28

In a group of people with no dog phobia, only 50% could also report a previously traumatic experience with a dog.

Key difference was that those who developed a phobia of dogs tended to focus on and become anxious about the possibility of having a similar experience in the future- this thought process influenced the way they processed dog info.

Question 29

Cognitive explanations

Strengths of cognitive explanations

Answer 29

• Better at explaining how phobias are maintained.
• Can be applied to social phobia and agoraphobia, since it emphasises negative thinking about expectations.
• Treatment based on this (e.g. cognitive restructuring) has been proved very effective.

Question 30

Cognitive explanations

Criticism of cognitive explanation

Answer 30

• Still weak on why some people develop phobias whilst others in a similar situation do not.

Question 31

Cognitive explanations

Forms of faulty thinking

Answer 31

• All or none thinking (dichotomous thinking)
• Arbitrary inferences
• Overgeneralisation
• Catastrophising
• Selective abstraction
• Excessive responsiblity

Question 32

Cognitive explanations

All or none thinking (dichotomous thinking)

Answer 32

Tendency to classify everything into 1/2 extreme categories, e.g. success and failure.

Question 33

Cognitive explanations

Arbitrary inferences

Answer 33

Drawing negative conclusions without having the evidence to support them.

Question 34

Cognitive explanations

Overgeneralisation

Answer 34

Incorrect conclusions are drawn from little evidence, e.g. a single incident.

Question 35

Cognitive explanations

Catastrophising

Answer 35

Where relatively normal events are perceived as disasters.

Question 36

Cognitive explanations

Selective abstraction

Answer 36

When a person only pays attention to certain features of an event and ignores other features that might lead to a different conclusion.

Question 37

Cognitive explanations

Excessive responsibility

Answer 37

Excessively taking responsiblity and blame for things which happen.

Question 38

Ellis’ ABC model - Cognitive explanations

ABC model

Answer 38

• A = adversity (negative event/circumstance)
• B = beliefs
• C = consequences

Question 39

Ellis’ ABC model - Cognitive explanations

Example of ABC model

Answer 39

• A = didn’t get selected for choir.
• B = have a terrible voice and never wants to sing again.
• C = gives up on practicing.