Definitions of abnormality

Question 1

What is deviation from social norms?

Answer 1

• Concerns behaviour that is different from the accepted standards of behaviour in a community or society

Question 2

What is statistical infrequency?

Answer 2

• Someone is mentally abnormal if their condition is very rare in the population, the rarity of the behaviour is judged objectively using statistics, comparing the individuals behaviour to the rest of the population

e.g being more depressed or less intelligent than most of the population

Question 3

What is one strength of statistical infrequency?

Answer 3

• Its usefulness
  -SI is used in clinical practice both as part of formal diagnosis & as a way to assess the severity of an individuals symptoms
• An ex. of SI used in assestment tool is the Beck depression inventory (BDI) a score of 30+ is widely interpreted as severe depression

Question 4

What is one limitation of statistical infrequency?

Answer 4

• Infrequent characteristics can be positive as well as negative

for e.g. for every person with an IQ below 70 there is another with an IQ above 130 yet we would not think of someone as abnormal for having a high IQ

• This means that although statistical infrequency can form part of assestment & diagnolstic procedures it is never as sufficient as the sole basis for defining abnormality

Question 5

What is one strength of deviation from social norms?

Answer 5

• Its usefulness
• Also like SI used in clinical practice

e.g. the key defining characterisitc of antisocial personality disorder is the failure to conform to culturally ethical acceptable behaviour i.e recklessness, aggression- theses signs of the disorder are all deviations from social norms

-This shows that the deviation from social norms criterion has value in psychiatry

Question 6

What is failure to function adequately?

Answer 6

Occurs when someone is unable to cope with ordinary demands of day to day living.

Question 7

How would you identify that someone is failing to function adequetly?

Answer 7

David Rosenhan & Martin Seligman (1989) have proposed some additional signs that can be used to determine when someone is not coping:

• When a person no longer conforms to standard interpersonal rules e.g., maintaining eye contact & respecting personal space
• When a person experiences severe personal distress
• When a persons behaviour becomes irrational or dangerous to themselves or others

Question 8

What is deviation from ideal mental health?

Answer 8

• Occurs when someone does not meet a set of criteria for good mental health

Question 9

What did Jahoda suggest good mental health looked like with a criteria?

Answer 9

• No symptoms or distress
• We are rational & can percieve ourselves accurately
• Can self-actualise
• Can cope with stress
• Have good self esteem & lack guilt
• We are independant of other people

Question 10

Give one strength of failure to function

Answer 10

• It allows the assessment of the DEGREE of abnormality-
• More symptoms the sufferer shows the more abnormal they are
• Therefore practitioners can decide who needs psychiatric help for their mental abnormality.
• This means it can be reliably applied.

Question 11

Give one disadvantage of failure to function.

Answer 11

• Abnormality is not always accompanied by dysfunction; for example, psychopaths can commit murder and still appear normal for example Harold Shipman was an English doctor (eventually diagnosed with psychopathy) who killed at least 215 patients over the 23 years whilst maintaining a respected appearance. This reduces the validity of the definition.
• There is a problem over deciding who has the right to define a behaviour as dysfunctional, for example what may be seen as irrational and unpredictable to one person may not seem so to another.
• Particularly a problem when people move from one culture to another. Therefore it is important to consider cultural relativism when applying the definition.

Question 12

Give one strength of deviation from mental health.

Answer 12

• It takes a POSITIVE approach to mental problems by focusing on what is desirable (e.g. working towards being autonomous) rather than what is undesirable (for example focusing a patient on the amount of distress they feel). This means that it can be practically applied by therapists.
• The definition is based on the humanistic approach, which says that people wish to fulfill their potential and be the best version of themselves seeking to achieve self-actualisation.
• One advantage of this is that it suggests that there people are not determined by their situation but have free will to make decisions about their life.
• This matters because the definition can be applied in humanistic therapy to treat people with mental disorders, which research (e.g. Kogstaff, 2011) suggests is effective in treating mental disorders.

Question 13

Give one weakness of deviation of mental health.

Answer 13

• The definition has been accused of having over demanding criteria- at any given moment most people do not meet all the ideals so in effect we are all ‘abnormal’. This reduces the validity of the definition.
• Furthermore, the criteria are difficult to measure. Jahoda argued mental health can be considered like physical health but diagnosing mental health is far more subjective in the absence of X rays etc. This reduces the reliability in which definition may be applied.