Depression Flashcards
What is depression according to the dsm-5?
All forms of depression and depressive disorders are characterised by changes to mood.
What are 5 categories of depression?
Major depressive disorder
Persistent depressive disorder
Disruptive mood dysregulation disorder
Premenstrual dysphoric disorder
Whats major depressive disorder?
Major depressive disorder - severe but often short term
What is persistent depressive disorder?
Persistent depressive disorder - long term or recurring depression, including sustained major depression (dysthymia)
What is disruptive mood dysregulation disorder?
Disruptive mood dysregulation disorder - childhood temper tantrums
Whats premenstrual dysphoric disorder?
Premenstrual dysphoric disorder – disruption to mood prior to and/or during menstruation.
What are the 3 behavioural characteristics of depression?
Reduced activity levels
Disruption to eating and sleeping patterns
Aggression and self harm
What is reduced activity levels?
People with depression have reduced energy levels = lethargy
Knock-on effect
Withdraw from work, education and social life
Severe cases = people cannot get out of bed
In some cases, it has the opposite effects and people develop psychomotor agitation. Individuals cannot relax and may pace the room.
What is disruption to eating and sleeping schedule?
May experience insomnia (premature waking) or increased need for sleep (hypersomnia).
Appetite and eating may increase or decrease
Could lead to weight loss or gain
Behaviour is disrupted by depression
What is aggression and self harm?
Irritable
Can become verbally or physically aggressive
Displayed differently depending on the individual
Can be aggression directed towards themselves including self-harm behaviour or suicide attempts
What are the 3 emotional characteristics of depression?
Lowered mood
Lowered self esteem
Anger
What is Lowered mood?
‘depressed’ = lowered mood (I.E. Feeling sad or low)
More to clinical depression than just feeling sad.
Lowered mood is still part of clinical depression
More pronounced than daily lethargy and sadness
Feelings of worthlessness and emptiness
What is anger?
Tend to experience more negative emotions than positive
Anger also frequently experiences alongside sadness
Can be extreme anger directed at others or themselves
Sometimes, emotions of anger lead to aggressive or self-harm behaviour.
What is lowered mood?
‘depressed’ = lowered mood (I.E. Feeling sad or low)
More to clinical depression than just feeling sad.
Lowered mood is still part of clinical depression
More pronounced than daily lethargy and sadness
Feelings of worthlessness and emptiness
What are the 3 cognitive characteristics of depression?
Poor concentration
Attending and dwelling on the negative
Absolutist thinking
What is poor concentration?
Unable to stick to a task
Difficult to make decisions
Can interfere with everyday life
What is attending to and dwelling on the negative?
Inclined to pay more attention to negative aspects and ignore positives. (glass half empty)
Bias towards recalling unhappy events- opposite to non-depressed people
What is absolutist thinking?
Most situations are not all-good or all-bad
Depressed people tend to think this way
‘black or white thinking’
Unfortunate situation = absolute disaster
What is the cognitive approach to explaining depression?
Means mental processes
So is focused on how our thoughts, perceptions and attention affect behaviour.
Key researchers= aaron beck (1967) and albert ellis (1962)
Beck’s negative triad
Ellis’s abc model
What is becks negative triad?
Explains why some people are more vulnerable to depression than others.
Focuses on cognitions that create the vulnerability.
What are the 3 parts of becks negative triad?
Faulty information processing
Negative self-schema
The negative triad
What is faulty information processing?
Attend to negative aspects of a situation more than positives
Blow small problems out of proportion and think in black-and white terms (cognitive characteristics)
Whats negative self schema?
A ‘package’ of ideas developed through experience.
Mental framework for interpretation of sensory information.
Self-schema= package of ideas about yourself.
Used to interpret the world around us.
Negative self-schema = negative interpretation of the world
Whats the negative triad?
Dysfunctional view of themselves developed because of three types of negative thinking.
Automatic negative thoughts regardless of the reality of what is happening around them.
What does the negative triad consist of?
Consists of:
Negative view of the world – ‘the world is a cold hard place.’ there is no hope
Negative view of the future – ‘there isn’t much chance that the economy would get better.’ reduce hopefulness and enhance depression
Negative view of the self – ‘I am a failure.’ enhance existing depressive feelings because they confirm low self-esteem
What is Ellis abc model?
Good mental health is the result of rational thinking (happy and free from pain).
Depression and anxiety are the result of irrational thoughts (anything which interferes with us being happy and free from pain).
Used abc model to explain how irrational thoughts affect behaviour and emotional state.
Ellis abc model
What is A?
A – activating event
Irrational thoughts are triggered by external events.
We get depressed when we experience negative events which can trigger irrational beliefs
I.E. Failing an important test or ending a relationship
Ellis abc model
What is B?
B – beliefs
Range of irrational beliefs
‘I-can’t-stand-it-itis’= major disaster whenever something does not go smoothly
‘utopianism’ = life is always meant to be fair
ELLIS ABC MODEL
What is C?
C – Consequences
Activating event triggers irrational beliefs = emotional and behavioural consequences
Must always success>failure>trigger depression
What is cognitive behavioural therapy?
Cognitive behavioural therapy
Most common treatment for depression and other mental health problems.
Cognitive and behavioural aspects
What are the cognative aspects of CBT?
Cognitive: client and therapist work together to identify issues and goals for the therapy.
Create a plan together to identify and challenge irrational thoughts.
What are the behavioural aspects of cbt?
Cognitive behaviour therapy
Behavioural: working together to change negative and irrational thoughts and put more effective behaviours in place
Cognitive approach to treating depression?
Three treatments based on explanations
Beck’s cognitive therapy
Ellis’s rational emotive behaviour therapy (rebt)
Behavioural activation
What is becks cognitive therapy?
What does cognitive therapy also involve?
Beck’s cognitive therapy
Identify negative triad thoughts and challenge them.
Cognitive therapy also involves testing the reality of negative beliefs.
Client as scientist.
Negative belief of ‘everyone hates me’ > write down an occasion when someone is nice to you.
Acts as evidence for future sessions when client may bring up negative thoughts, the therapist has evidence to dispute this.
What is Ellis’s rational emotive behaviour therapy (rebt)?
Extension of abc model.
Includes abcde model (d = dispute and e = effort)
Central ideas = identify and dispute irrational thoughts.
E.G. Client thinks their life is unfair, therapist challenges utopianism and irrational beliefs, in the form of a vigorous argument.
Idea is to break the link between the negative life event and depression.
Empirical argument: is there actually evidence to support this irrational belief?
Logical argument: does the negative thought logically follow from the facts presented?
Whats behavioural activation?
Behavioural activation
Increased depression => increased avoidance of difficult situations => isolation => maintains or worsens symptoms.
Goal is to gradually decrease avoidance and isolation and increase engagement with activities to improve mood
Therapist aims to reinforce these types of activities.
