Psychological disorders Flashcards
What are psychological disorders? How prevalent are psychological disorders?
patterns of thoughts, feelings, or actions that are deviant, distressful , and dysfunctional. 40% afflicted in any 6 month period; 50% probability during your life time
How do psychologists determine what is a disorder?
is it deviant, distressful, is there dysfunction
How do psychologists diagnose a disorder and why are diagnostics important?
is it deviant, distressful, is there dysfunction and diagnostics are important because improve the effectiveness of treatments and avoid long-term complications
What is the DSM and what are some criticisms of the DSM?
describes the primary indicators/symptoms of disorders and how many need to be present to make a diagnosis: criticisms include labels too many people as disordered, the boarder between disorder and normal seems arbitrary, decisions about what is a disorder seems to include value judgements
What did David Rosenhan find in his study on psychiatric hospitalization?
that the only people to be able to tell that the patients were not schizophrenic were the other patients.
What are mood disorders?
involve extremely sad low energy moods or swings between extremely high and low moods
What are the criteria for major depressive disorder?
one or both of the first two symptoms plus three or more of the rest
What are some causes of depression?
Biological and Genetic
What is bipolar disorder and mania?
person alternates between depression and mania; mania is a hyperactive wildly optimistic state during which poor judgement is common
What are anxiety disorders? What are the types of anxiety disorders?
marked by excessive an uncontrollable worry; generalized anxiety disorder, OCD, PTSD, Panic disorder, and phobias
What is obsessive-compulsive disorder?
Obsessions and compulsions
What are some causes of anxiety disorders?
classical conditioning: associate a stimuli with anxiety, operant conditioning: receive rewards for avoidance, observational learning: see other worrying and imitate it, Cognitive appraisals: uncertainty is danger
How do the medical model and the biopsychosocial approach differ?
medical focuses more on biology contributions where as the biopsychosocial approach focuses more on understanding human health and illness
What is epigenetics?
the study of the molecular mechanisms by which environments can influence genetic expression
What is the prevalence of suicide and what are some risk factors for suicide?
someone commits suicide every 40 sec; anxiety, depressed
