Clinical psych

Question 1

Explain one strength of the diagnostic guidelines of mood (affective) disorders.

Answer 1

• (ICD-11) have been developed by experts in the field and are regularly updated. = improves the validity of the guidelines as experts review the diagnostic criteria and update them with new findings from research about mood disorders.
• they are holistic guidelines with many different types of mood disorders given. This will help the
  patient to get a very precise diagnosis and treatment (e.g. bipolar, unipolar).
• they are used in many countries around the world to diagnose mental health problems so have
  good generalisability. Mood disorders can be diagnosed in a similar way across around the
  world.
• Guidelines are objective and give a precise outline of the mood disorder and its symptoms.
• Practitioners can use these guidelines to diagnose their patients with mood disorders based on
  the symptoms described.

Question 2

Explain the sampling technique that was used to recruit participants in this study in freeman

Answer 2

• the sampling technique is volunteer (self-selecting sample). (1)
• ‘participants were recruited by advertising within University College London.’ (

Question 3

Explain one reason why Freeman et al. did not use participants with a history of mental
illness.

Answer 3

• Freeman research was exploratory (1) a pilot study, to investigate whether the technique would be appropriate. (2)
• participants without a mental illness could feed back on the technique (1), perhaps unlike
  people with mental illness (who have persecutory ideation). (2)

Question 4

Suggest how one sampling technique could have been used to recruit participants for this study, other than the technique used by Freeman et al.

Answer 4

• opportunity sample (1) used by asking people around the campus to participate. (2)
• snowball sample (1) one person, perhaps known to researchers, mentions it to other
  students. (2)

Question 5

Explain one strength and one weakness of using students as participants in research using
virtual reality.

Answer 5

Strengths:
* students may be more intelligent and so be able to provide better feedback to the researchers
(1) on the applicability of virtual reality (VR). (2)
* students are readily available on a university campus and in relatively large numbers so a
larger sample can be obtained (1) which will be more representative of the general population
in relation to responses to VR / ideation. (2)
* students may be more familiar with virtual reality, having played VR games, and ‘modern
technology’ (1) and so will be a good population to use to test VR applications.

Weakness:
students are often Westernised, Educated, from Industrialised, Rich Democracies (WEIRD) (1)
and this may restrict the applicability of the VR technique worldwide. (2)
* students may know about the research and so may bias or alter answers to fit aims of study (1)
whereas the target population for this VR application would not know about the research.

Question 6

What do Gottesman and Shields (1972) mean by the term ‘genetic
explanation of schizophrenia’?

Answer 6

this means that there is a link between schizophrenia and inherited
genetic material. (1) This suggests that the closer a person’s genetic
link is to someone who has been diagnosed with schizophrenia (and
therefore the more similar their genetic make-up is); the more likely that
person is to also be diagnosed with schizophrenia.

Question 7

Describe the cognitive explanation of schizophrenia, as outlined by Frith
(1992).

Answer 7

the cognitive explanation of schizophrenia states that schizophrenia
is caused by a problem of faulty information processing. Frith
suggested specifically that people with schizophrenia may have faulty
‘metacognitive’ processes and have difficulties reflecting on thoughts,
emotions and behaviours. This could also be linked with theory of mind
and the way that people with schizophrenia struggle to understand the
behaviour of others. They may also have problems with attention and
with generating self-initiated actions as well as problems recognising
their own ‘inner speech’ which may explain the auditory hallucinations

Question 8

Types of Schizophrenia: Paranoid

Answer 8

When people have delusional thoughts and hallucinations and may experience huge delusions

Question 9

Types of Schizophrenia: Disorganized

Answer 9

Patient have disorganized behavior, thoughts and speech patterns, may experience auditory hallucinations

Question 10

Types of Schizophrenia: Simple

Answer 10

Patient will gradually withdraw themselves from reality

Question 11

Types of Schizophrenia: Catatonic

Answer 11

Patient will have motor activity disturbances, can include the patient sitting/standing in the exact same place for ages

Question 12

Types of Schizophrenia: Undifferentiated

Answer 12

Patient doesn’t fit into one of the other types, but is still experiencing other thoughts + behaviors

Question 13

positive symptoms of schizophrenia
negative symptoms of schizophrenia

Answer 13

1. delusions and hallucinations
2. the absence of appropriate behaviors (expressionless faces, rigid bodies)

Question 14

Second generation antipsychotics

Answer 14

Designed to block dopamine receptors but produce fewer side affects

Question 15

Electro convulsive therapy

Answer 15

Schizophrenics would receive a brief application of electricity in order to induce a seizure, electrodes are fitted to the patients head and a small electric current is run through them for up to a second

Question 16

Strengths of ECT + Weaknesses of ECT

Answer 16

There is evidence to suggest that it works
Ethical issues + long term effects are largely unknown

Question 17

CBT - Cognitive behavioral therapy

Answer 17

Aims to change or modify peoples thoughts and beliefs and also change the way they process information

Question 18

CBT, Sensky et al, 2000

Answer 18

Tested the potential usefulness of CBT for persistent symptoms of schizophrenia, all patients were 16-60, had diagnosis of schizophrenics, had symptoms for at least 6 months, didn’t abuse alcohol and drugs. Interventions were delivered by experienced nurses, and there was a 9 month by a different therapist. It showed that the therapy did result in a reduction in both positive and negative symptoms.

Question 19

Manic epsiodes

Answer 19

• a period of at least 2 weeks where theres a mixture of manic and depressive states

Question 20

Depressive episodes

Answer 20

A period of at least 2 weeks, which involves depressed mood or lack of intrest in usual actvoties for most day nearly daily

Question 21

Hypomanic epsiodes

Answer 21

A less extreme version of a manic episode which involves 7 days of persisint elevated mood or increased irritability

Question 22

Type 1 bipolar bipolar disorder

Answer 22

• episodic mood disorder
• occurnece of at least 1 manic or mixed episode lasting 1 weeks
  -extreme mood, feeling euphoric/irritiable and HIGH levels of actiitu and increased energy
• rapid speech, impulsivity and recklessness and grandeur and mood swings
• mixed episode is mixture or rapid alternation between manic and depressive states on most days during 2 week period

Question 23

Definition of mood disorders

Answer 23

• affective disorders defined by DSM-IV as mental disorders characterized by disturbances of mood tht are intense and persient to be clearly maladaptive.

Question 24

Symtoms of unipolar depressiom

Answer 24

-physical: change in appetite, sleeping problems such as insomnia/hypersomnia or pattern disturbance, excessive sleeping as a trial to escape from reality, fatigue
– cognitive: problematic decision making, slow and tangled thinking, pessimistic spirit, impaired memory and concentration, suicide plot
– social: social withdrawal due to not gaining pleasure from social interactions, feeling of not contributing
– emotional: sadness, unhappiness, distress, loss of pleasure, pessimism, low mood
– behavioral: disrupted self-care, takes more time to complete everyday activities, reduced sex drive

Question 25

Bipolar depressiom

Answer 25

-cognitive: disturbed thought processes, delusional ideas, reckless decisions
– emotional: feel fantastic, no social inhibition, confidence, deny anything is wrong
– behavioral: talk fast, reckless actions with bad consequences
– physical: little amount of sleep, increased energy level, super active

Question 26

Measuring depression

Answer 26

• BDI - becks depression inventory MCQ to asses severity of depression.
• High levels of reliability and validity
• Test is ibjective due to quantaive measure so no experiemnter bias
• but self report so ppt bias/social desirbaility
• BDI used in clinical settings as tool that elps diagnose and treat depression

Question 27

Genetic and neurochemical (Oruc et al., 1997) - depression exlanation

Answer 27

Depression has a genetic basis. Oruc et al. found the participants in their study with bipolar disorder – sixteen of the participants had at least one first
degree relative who had a major affective disorder.
- polymorphisms in the genes of the participants could be responsible for the increased risk of developing bipolar disorder (just with the females in the sample).
-(low levels of serotonin).

Question 28

Cognitive (Beck, 1979)- depression explanation

Answer 28

• Depression due to faulty processing of information. - - Created the cognitive triad
  (negative views about the world, negative views about oneself and negative views about the future) which all influence each other and can lead the
• depressed individual to spiral into lowering moods.

Question 29

Nature versus nurture: ORUC

Answer 29

• genetics —> nature
• Genes are passed from one generation to the next and so if a parent has depressive episodes
  then the nature approach suggests that a person may inherit the genes that cause depressive episodes
  from a parent.
• The findings of the Oruč et al. study do not support this claim, but it is just one study with a
  limited focus. It does not mean that the nature explanation is wrong

Question 30

Determinism versus free-will: ORUC

Answer 30

• Focusing on genetics as the cause of depressive episodes is biological determinism.
• The Oruč et al. study does not consider free-will at all.
• A cognitive explanation would consider
  free-will

Question 31

Reductionism versus holism: ORUC

Answer 31

• Oruč et al. focused on the serotonin transmitters and serotonin receptors only, and so this is reductionist because it does not study other potential aspects of gene transmission
• it does not consider the role of psychological
  factors that may cause depressive episodes.
• A more holist approach would suggest that many factors including both biological and psychological factors should be taken into consideration