Depression (Psychopathology) Flashcards
Depression
depression and depressive disorders are characterised by changes to mood. DSM-V has the following categories:
Major depressive disorder - severe but short term.
Persistent depressive disorder - long term or recurring depression including sustained major depression.
Disruptive mood dysregulation disorder - childhood temper tantrums.
Premenstrual dysphoric disorder - disruption to mood prior to and/or during menstruation.
Neuroses disorders
Unipolar disorder: an episode of depression that can occur suddenly
-can be reactive (for example to the death of a loved one)
-can be endogenous (neurological factors)
Bipolar disorder: manic and depressive
-change of mood in regular cycles
-Mania: over-activity, rapid speech and feeling happy or agitated
Emotional characteristics of depression
Lowered mood: defining emotional element of depression, feeling worthless and empty.
Anger: sufferers can experience extreme anger that may be at self or others.
Lowered self-esteem: sufferers tend to report lowered self-esteem, describing a sense of self-loathing.
Behavioural characteristics of depression
Anxiety levels: reduced levels of energy (lethargic). Leads to withdrawal from work, education and social life.
Psychomotor agitation: inability to relax and end up pacing.
Disruption to sleep and eating behaviour: can lead to insomnia and hypersomnia. Appetites increases or decreases leading to weight gain or loss.
Aggression and self harm: can be irritable, leading to verbal or physical aggression.
Anhedonia: decreased ability to feel pleasure and loss of interest.
Cognitive characteristics of depression
Poor concentration: difficulty concentrating on a problem and may ruminate, poor decision making.
Attending to and dwelling on the negative: focuses on more negative aspects than positive, a bias towards recalling unhappy events rather than happy ones
Absolutist thinking: all good or all bad or black and white thinking. Situations seen as complete disasters.
Assumptions of the cognitive approach to depression
-Individuals who suffer from mental disorders have distorted and irrational thinking- which may cause maladaptive behaviour.
-It is the way you think about the problem rather than the problem itself which causes the mental disorder.
-Individuals can overcome mental disorders by learning to use more appropriate cognition. If people think in more positive ways, they can be helped to feel better.
Aaron Beck 1967
Beck suggested that there is a cognitive explanation as to why some people are more vulnerable to depression than others. He suggested three parts to this cognitive vulnerability:
-faulty information processing
-negative self-schemas
-the negative triad
Faulty information processing (Beck)
Beck believed that people who are depressed make fundamental errors in logic. Proposed that people who have depression tend to selectively attend to the negative aspects of a situation and ignore the positive aspects. There is a tendency to blow small problems out of proportion with thinking on terms of black and white and ignoring the middle ground; you are a success or a failure.
Negative self schema (Beck)
People who have depression have developed negative self-schemas and therefore they interpret all the information about themselves in a negative way.
The negative triad
Build on the idea of maladaptive responses and suggested that people with depression become trapped in a cycle of negative thoughts. They have a tendency to view themselves, the world and the future in pessimistic ways- the triad of impairments.
Albert Ellis
Ellis proposed that good mental health is the result of rational thinking. Argued that there are common irrational beliefs that underlie much depression and sufferers have based their lives on these beliefs. For example: “I must be successful, competent and achieving in everything I do if I am to consider myself worthwhile.”
Ellis’ ABC Theory
-Activating event A: We get depressed when we experience negative events and these trigger irrational beliefs
-Beliefs B: Ellis identified a range of irrational beliefs: we must always succeed or achieve perfection ‘musturbation’, perceiving whatever doesn’t go smoothly as a disaster, utopianism (life is always meant to be fair)
-Consequence C: When an activating even triggers irrational beliefs, there are emotional and behavioural consequences.
Weissman and Beck 1978 (method, result and conclusion)
Thought processes were measured using the dysfunction attitude scale (DAS). Participants filled in a questionnaire by ticking wether they agreed or disagreed with statements.
They found that participants with depression made more negative assessments than those who weren’t depressed. When given therapy to counter their negative schemas there was an improvement in their self-ratings
Depression involves the use of negative schemas.
Supporting evidence for Beck 2 (evaluations for the cognitive approach to depression)
Much research has supported the proposal that depression is associated with faulty information processing, negative self schemas and the triad of impairments.
Grazioli and Terry 2000 assessed 65 pregnant women for cognitive vulnerability and depression before and after birth
Those high in cognitive vulnerability were more likely to suffer post-natal depression
Cognitive Behaviour Therapy
CBT is the most commonly used psychological treatment for depression as well as other mental health problems.
-based on both behavioural and cognitive techniques.
-The therapist aims to make the client aware of the relationship between thought, emotion and actions.
-can help people to change how they think (‘cognitive’) and what they do (‘behaviour’). These changes can help them to feel better.
breaking the cycle maladaptive thinking, feelings and behaviour.
Focused on present struggles, not past.
When the parts of the sequence are clearly outlined and understood, they can be changed.
CBT aims to get the person to a point where they can fix their problems independently.
