Anxiety Disorders & Personality Disorders Flashcards
What is a personality disorder?
An umbrella term that covers a number of variations of maladaptive personality traits that cause significant psychosocial distress and interfere with everyday functioning.
There are 3 clusters of personality disorders: A, B, and C.
What typically defines a Type A personality disorder?
Characterised by odd or eccentric behaviors.
You find it difficult to relate to other people.
What are the 3 types of Type A personality disorder?
- Paranoid
- Schizoid
- Schizotypal
What characterises a paranoid personality disorder?
A pervasive and enduring pattern of irrational suspicion and mistrust of others
Demonstrates hypersensitivity to criticism and potential slights
Exhibits reluctance to confide in others due to fear of information being used maliciously against them
Often preoccupied with unfounded beliefs about perceived conspiracies against themselves
What characterises a schizoid personality disorder?
Characterised by an enduring pattern of detachment from social relationships and a restricted range of emotional expression
Displays a pervasive lack of interest in or desire for interpersonal relationships, often preferring solitary activities
Shows an emotional coldness, detachment, or flattened affectivity
Often has few, if any, close relationships outside of immediate family
What characterises a schizotypal personality disorder?
Characterised by a chronic pattern of impaired social interactions, distorted cognitions and perceptions, and eccentric behaviors
Demonstrates inappropriate or constricted affect, and peculiar, eccentric or bizarre behavior
Displays odd thinking and speech, such as magical thinking, peculiar ideas, paranoid ideation, and belief in the influence of external forces
Shares certain cognitive or perceptual distortions with schizophrenia, but maintains a more intact grasp on reality
What type of personality disorder features a lack of interest or desire to form relationships with others and feelings that this is of no benefit to them?
Schizoid
What type of personality disorder features difficulty in trusting or revealing personal information to others?
Paranoid
What type of personality disorder features unusual beliefs, thoughts and behaviours, as well as social anxiety that makes forming relationships difficult?
Schizotypal
What typically defines a Type B personality disorder?
Cluster B personality disorders are grouped based on those who find it difficult to control their emotions. You might be viewed as unpredictable by others.
Characterised by dramatic, emotional, or erratic behaviors
What are the 4 types of Type B personality disorders?
- Antisocial
- Borderline
- Histrionic
- Narcissistic
What characterises antisocial PD?
Defined by a pervasive pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others.
- Individuals with this disorder exhibit a lack of empathy and frequently engage in manipulative, impulsive actions.
- Manifestations include aggressive, unremorseful behavior, and consistent irresponsibility, which often results in a failure to obey laws and social norms.
What characterises borderline PD?
Characterized by a recurring pattern of abrupt mood swings, unstable personal relationships, and self-image instability.
- The propensity towards self-harm is commonly observed in these patients.
- Relationships often fluctuate between extremes of idealization and devaluation, a process known as “splitting”.
- There is often an inability to control temper and manage affective responses appropriately.
What characterises hisitrionic PD?
Predominantly characterized by attention-seeking behaviors and excessive displays of emotion.
- Individuals may display inappropriate sexual behaviors.
- Their emotional expressions tend to be shallow, dramatic, and often perceived as exaggerated.
- They often perceive relationships as being more intimate than they truly are, reflecting a distorted perception of interpersonal boundaries.
What characterises narcissistic PD?
Characterized by a persistent pattern of grandiosity, a strong need for the admiration of others, and a marked lack of empathy.
- Individuals with this disorder often display a sense of entitlement and will exploit others to fulfill their own desires.
- Tendency to be arrogant and preoccupied with personal fantasies and desires, often at the cost of disregarding others’ feelings and needs.
In which PD is there a propensity towards self-harm?
Borderline PD
In which PD may patients display inappropriate sexual behaviors?
Histrionic
Which type of PD features fluctuating strong emotions and difficulties with identity and maintaining healthy relationships?
Borderline
Which type of PD features the need to be at the centre of attention and having to perform for others to maintain that attention?
Histrionic
Which type of PD features feelings that they are special and need others to recognise this or else they get upset?
Narcissistic
What typically defines a Type C personality disorder?
People with cluster C personality disorders have strong feelings of fear or anxiety.
What are the 3 types of Type C PD?
- Avoidant
- Dependent
- Obsessive-compulsive
What characterises avoidant PD?
Characterized by intense feelings of social inadequacy, fear of rejection, and hypersensitivity to criticism
Patients often self-impose isolation to avoid potential criticism, despite a strong desire for social acceptance and interaction
What characterises dependent PD?
Characterized by a pervasive and excessive need to be taken care of, leading to submissive and clinging behavior
Individuals often lack self-confidence and initiative, relying excessively on others for decision-making
Patients may urgently seek new relationships as a source of care and support when existing ones end
What characterises obsessive-compulsive PD?
Characterized by an excessive preoccupation with orderliness, perfectionism, and control, often at the expense of flexibility, openness, and efficiency
- Contrary to obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (OCPD) is not associated with recurrent, intrusive thoughts or rituals
- Indications may include strict adherence to routines, perfectionism to the point of dysfunction, and a persistent reluctance to delegate tasks to others
- Symptoms are generally ego-syntonic, meaning the patient perceives them as rational and desirable, thereby differentiating OCPD from OCD, where symptoms are typically ego-dystonic and distressing to the individual.
What type of PD features severe anxiety about rejection or disapproval and avoidance of social situations or relationships?
Avoidant
What type of PD features heavy reliance on others to make decisions and take responsibility for their lives, taking a very passive approach?
Dependent
What type of PD features unrealistic expectations of how things should be done by themselves and others, and catastrophising about what will happen if these expectations are not met?
Obsessive-compulsive
Define anxiety
Anxiety can be defined as a constellation of psychological and physiological responses to a potential/uncertain threat and is an essential function of the central nervous system (CNS).
It is analogous to pain in that it is an unpleasant experience which exists to automatically motivate us to avoid harm.
What are the most common mental health conditions globally?
Anxiety - lifetime prevalence ranges from 5% to 29%
What is ‘trait anxiety’?
Your propensity to experience the anxiety response when exposed to a stressor.
What do trait anxieties arise from?
It is a stable characteristic arising from a multitude of genetic and environmental factors, particularly adaptive responses to experiences of potential threat during development (for instance bullying, trauma, neglect or parental loss), as well as the nature of early attachment relationships.
These experiences ‘calibrate’ the CNS response to a threat in adulthood.
How do trait anxieties relate to survival?
High trait anxiety confers a greater survival advantage – if an organism tends to avoid harm in dangerous situations, it is more likely to survive and reproduce
How can early life attachments impact trait anxiety?
In brief, the close and reciprocal relationship between an infant/child and its parent(s) is the crucible within which the developing brain learns how to think and feel.
Through countless repeated daily experiences of being cared for, comforted when in pain, reassured when anxious – essentially, loved – a child gradually internalises and develops the ability to think, regulate emotion and cope with anxiety independently. For this development to take place, parental care simply needs to be “good enough” (the technical term in attachment psychology), but if this care is inconsistent, dismissive or perhaps even frightening, various problems can emerge, including high trait anxiety.
What is ‘state anxiety’?
“State anxiety” is simply the state of feeling anxious.
Give some pyschological symptoms of state anxiety
An unpleasant feeling of suspense, recurrent automatic thoughts about negative outcomes (rumination or “worrying”), reduced concentration, hypervigilance
