Option: Abnormal Psychology 3 Flashcards
What is a disorder?
Disorder: a clinically significant disturbance in an individual’s cognition, emotional regulation, or behaviour.
What are biological treatments of depression?
Antidepressants: medication which targets depressive symptoms by affecting the levels of neurotransmitters in the brain.
Neurotransmitters effecting depression:
- Seratonin (stabilizes mood and sleeping cycles)
- Fluoxetine
What are psychological treatments of depression?
CBT: cognitive behavioural therapy:
- targets automatic thoughts and behaviour and adjusts them to being more rational and suited to the environment.
Interpersonal Psychotherapy: focuses on relieving symptoms of depression by improving interpersonal functioning.
Discuss one or more ways psychologists can assess the effectiveness of treatment.
Severity of the Disorder: some treatments work better with milder cases of depression, while others work better in severe cases.
Treatment Outcomes: observable reduction of symptoms (self reported improvement of quality of life)
The Time Frame: some treatments are more effective short-term while others are more effective long-term.
Method of Measuring: observable changes (do not capture the complexity of disorders), self-reported changes (less reliable).
Placebo Effect: method is effective if it outpreforms a placebo.
Response Rate: percentage of participants showing a decrease in standardized depression scales.
Remission Rates: percentage of participants who show little to no symptoms after their treatment period.
Relapse Rates: percentage of participants in which the past condition has reoccured (once treatment was discontinued).
Which studies, and in what order, should be used in a question on the treatment of disorders?
1) Eysenk (no difference with and without treatment)
2) Glass and Smith (treated patients are healthier)
3) TADS (treatment is better than no treatment)
4) Elkin (treatment effectiveness differs between the severity of the disorder)
5) Hollon (treatment effectiveness differs in relapse rates)
Describe the study completed by Eysenk et al.
- reviewed available data and arrived at a conclusion that **PSYCHOTHERAPY DOES NOT WORK. **
- he discovered that** 67%** of patients after 2 years have recovered without treatment, which is similar ro the rate of success in psychotherapy.
- this research led to multiple attempts to testing the effectiveness of psycholtherapy.
- it caused metaanalysis to emerge.
Describe the study conducted by Glass and Smith.
- conducted a metaanalyses on 375 studies (very carefully selected their bases of methodological quality)
- concluded that: PSYCHOTHERAPY IS EFFECTIVE
- a typical client was healthier than 75% percent of untreated individuals (compared to the 50% by random chance)
Discuss the study done by TADS.
AIM: to examine the short term and long term effectiveness of drug treatment and psychotherapy for depression.
PARTCIPANTS:
- 13 different clinics
- 439 participants of differing severity of depression.
PROCEDURE:
- longitudinal study
- 3 stages
1) Acute treatment for 12 weeks
- antidepressants alone (fluoxetine)
- CBT alone
- antidepressants and CBT
- placebo
2) Consolidation treatment 6 weeks
- clients from placebo changed treatment methods and were eiminated from the study.
3) Continuation of treatment 18 weeks
- assess the long-term effectiveness of treatment
- response rates were used to measure the effectiveness of treatment
RESULTS:
- all 3 active treatments outpreformed the pllacebo group.
- CBT usually reaches the same level of effectiveness as mediacation+CBT combined
- medication is more effective than psychotherapy in short-term but not long-term
EVALUATION:
Srengths:
- Easily replicated,
- medium population validity (large sample (439) and participant variability however USA sample that is underage)
- high ecological validity
Weaknessess:
- low internal validity
- low construct validity
Describe the study conducted by Elkin et al.
AIM: to support the idea that the severity of depression must be taken into account when determining the effectiveness of treatment.
PARTCIPANTS:
- 250 patients
PROCEDURE:
- randomly allocated the participants into 1 of 4 groups:
1) antidepressants + clinical management
2) CBT
3) interpersonal psychotherapy
4) placebo + clinical management
- participants underwent treatment for 16 weeks.
RESULTS:
- all 3 active treatment conditions outpreformed the placebo.
- for milder cases of depression the 3 active treatments did not differ in effectiveness,
- for severe cases of depression antidepressands had an advantage.
CONCLUSION:
- the severity of depression is crucial to the determining the effectiveness of treatment
EVALUATION:
Srengths:
- high ecological validity
Weaknessess:
- ethics (some patients were not given treatment)
- low population validity (small sample)
- low internal validity (outside was not controlled)
- low construct validity (qualitative data)
Discuss the study conducted by Hollon et al.
AIM: to investigate the effectiveness of treatment (based on remission rates).
PARTCIPANTS:
PROCEDURE:
- participants were alocated into 1 of 3 groups:
1) CBT (all participants withdrawn after 12 months)
2) antidepressants (continued)
3) antidepressants (discontinued and switched to placebo pills)
RESULTS
- relapse rates were smallest in CBT,
- relapse rates were biggest in antidepressants which were switched for a placebo.
- CBT: enduring effect that extends beyond the end of treatment
- medication :often does not have an enduring effect
CONCLUSION:
- medication mainly targets the symptoms of depression but not the cause
- drugs are useful for short term management
EVALUATION:
Srengths:
- high ecological validity (pre-existing treatment)
- no demand characteristics
Weaknessess:
- ethics (harm)
- low generalizability (MDD symptoms vary across patients)
- low construct validity
- low internal validity
Discuss the role of culture in the treatment of disorders.
Culture: unique meaning and information system shared across a group of individuals and transmitted across generations.
Disorder: a clinically significant disturbance in an individual’s cognition, emotional regulation, or behaviour.
Depression: a mood disorder that causes a persistent feeling of sadness and loss of interest.
Studies to use: Kinzie et al.; Zhang et al.
What are the three cultural barriers to treatment?
1) Cognitive Barriers
2) Affective Barriers
3) Sociocultural Barriers
What is the Cognitive Barrier?
Cognitive barriers include beliefs that seeking professional psychological treatment is unnecessary, a sign of weakness, or ineffective.
- Some ethnic minorities (Asian, Hispanic and African Americans) share the belief that mental hardships should be overcome by willpower, self control, and the endurance of difficulty without complaint.
- People from different cultures may also doubt the effectiveness of modern Psychological treatment, and may prefer their own traditional healing or spiritual practices, such as prayer
What is the Affective Barrier?
Affective barriers include feelings of shame at seeking psychological help, or anxiety at being judged by others.
- In many cultures, there is still considerable stigma attached to mental illness, and so there can be a great deal of shame in being diagnosed with a disorder.
- Furthermore, in highly collective cultures (Asian cultures), seeking mental health treatment may be seen as an embarrassment to the entire family, suggesting that the family is somehow broken or dysfunctional.
- In some cases, there may be family pressure to avoid seeking treatment, in order to preserve the family reputation.
What is the Sociocultural Barrier?
Sociocultural barriers include the reluctance to share personal and family problems with a stranger, particularly someone from a different culture.
- In order for therapy to be effective, a patient must be willing to open up and discuss sensitive emotional issues, and this may be difficult for people whose culture does not regard talking about problems as an effective way of overcoming them.
- In many cultures, family problems are to be kept strictly within the family, out of the need to preserve the reputation and social standing of the clan. In this context, discussing family dysfunction with outsiders could be considered a form of disloyalty.
