Anxiety Flashcards
8 marks Characteristics of anxiety disorders
- characteristics of generalised anxiety and case studies
- types: agoraphobia and specific phobias (blood, animal, button)
- measures: BIPI, GAD-7
8 marks Explanations of phobias
- behavioural (classical conditioning)
- psychoanalytic (Freud)
- biomedical (Ost)
- cognitive (Dinardo)
8 marks Treatment and management of anxiety disorders
- systematic desensitisation
- applied tension
- CBT
What is characteristics of GAD (generalised anxiety disorder) / case studies of phobias
GAD: Anxiety that is generalised or persistent or even more strongly predominating in particular environmental circumstances
- according to DSM, at least 3 of the following need to be present for past 6 months or longer: such as: physical tension, problems centrating, feeling irritable
Describe measures: GAD-7 and BIPI
BIPI
- 50 items about diverse situation related to blood, injection, dentist, e.g. when I see a bloody wound
- measures frequency of different types of responses on a 4 point scale 0 never to 3 always
- appraise both situational and anticipatory anxiety responses
GAD-7
- assigning scores to e.g. trouble relaxing? worring too much about different things?
- total score for 7 items ranges from 0-21
- 0-5 mild anxiety, 15-21 severe
Evaluate measures of anxiety
For BIPI:
- quantatitive
- holistic (cog, phy, beh responses)
- social desirability
- only targets blood, lacks usefulness
For GAD-7:
- quantatitive
- useful
- cultural bias: language
- social desirability
Describe Types: agoraphobia and specific phobias
Phobia: irrational fear that is disproportionate
Blood phobia
- avoid situations, injections
- can extend to needles, invasive medical procedure
animal phobia
- avoid contact, distress, panic attack when exposed
button phobia
agoraphobia
- being in open spaces, being in a crowd, panic attack
Kimya: bird phobia (sound of birds flapping wings upsetting)
Savedra and silverman: button phobia
Behavioural explanation of phobia (Watson, 1920)
An individual may develop a phobia of a harmless stimulus if it is paired with a frightening experience
LITTLE ALBERT
- touches white rat (NS)
- struck metal bar with hammer (US), produces fear (UCR)
- seeing rate = crying, moving away
- fear generalised
- fear can be learned through CC
Describe Psychoanalytic explanation of phobia (Freud, 1909)
Phallic stage
- defence mechanism, unsolved conflicts between Id and superego
- ego attempts to solve by repression and displacement (repression=forget, displacement=rechannel, e.g. Hans father and horse)
Little hans
- fear of horse, especially with black part around its mouth
- horse represents his father
Describe Biomedical/genetic explanation (Ost, 1992)
Biological preparedness
- 81 blood phobic and 59 injection phobic compared with other specific phobia sample
- 50% of blood phobic had one or more parents with the same fear
- strong genetic link for these phobias
Describe Cognitive explanation for phobias (DiNardo et al, 1988)
Origin of cynophobia (dogs), interviewed, discuss frightening encounters in cynophobes and non-cynophobes
Similar events reported
- only half of people who had a traumatic experience with animal developed phobia of animal
- interpret the event differently from those who developed phobia
- the exaggerated expectation of harm leads to development of phobia
10 marks Evaluate for explanation of phobias
Ethics
- Little Albert
- Freud
Nature Nurture
- biomedical, preparedness
- Cognitive, psychoanalytic (both, id is nature, superego is nurture)
Reductionism and Holism
H: Freud, fears, dreams, conversations, over a number of years
Cognitive, both events and thinking
R: biomedical, behavioural
Determinism and Freewill
F: behavioual (can be unlearnt), cognitive (rationalise thoughts)
D: Psychoanalytic (cannot choose whether at phallic stage)
Genetic (inherited)
Describe systematic desensitisation as a treatment
Systematic desensitisation
- reciprocal inhibition
- functional analysis (hierarchy of fear)
- relaxation training (muscular tension, control breathing)
- graduated exposure
- in vivo or in vitro
Describe applied tension as a treatment
Specifically for blood phobia
- help prevent fainting or recover faster if faint
- tensing muscle in body, raises blood pressure, less likely to faint
- tense muscle for 10-15s, the relax for 20-30, repeat 5 times
Ost et al
- patients treated with applied tension, applied relaxation or combination, for different number of sessions
- favour applied tension since it is as effective but take shortest time
Describe CBT as a treatment
building a relationship, cognitive restructuring, relaxation technique
Ost and Westling
- patients with panic disorder
- treated individually for 12 weekly sessions
- both AR and CBT yielded very large improvements, which were maintained, or furthered at follow up
- CBT group had a significant reduction in the number of panic attacks after treatment (74%) and at follow up (89%)
