Psychopathology Flashcards

Question

Anxiety hierarchy

Answer 1

A list of situations involving the phobic stimulus from least to most scary, created by the patient and therapist together.

Answer 2

The process that underpins systematic desensitisation - replacing a stimulus-response association with a new, more positive, learned response

Answer 3

The theory that two conflicting emotions (e.g. fear and relaxation) cannot co-exist at the same time.

Answer 4

A behavioural therapy in which a phobic patient is exposed to an extreme form of a phobic stimulus in order to reduce anxiety triggered by that stimulus. This takes place across a small number of long therapy sessions

Answer 5

Therapies which prevent the avoidance of the phobic stimulus by putting the patient in a situation where they encounter the phobic stimulus.

Answer 6

Conditioned stimuli aren't permanent unless they are occasionally paired with the UCS. In phobias this doesn't happen when the phobic encounters the phobic stimulus for an extended time so the learnt response will go be unlearnt.

Answer 7

Patients cannot maintain high levels of fear for prolonged periods of time. When facing a phobic stimulus eventually they become too tired to maintain high levels of anxiety and fear.

Answer 8

Focused on how our internal mental processes affect behaviour

Answer 9

Beck said depressives interpret information about themselves in a negative way. Schema is a ‘package’ of information based on experience, used to interpret the world.

Answer 10

Beck proposed that there were three kinds of negative thinking that contributed to becoming depressed: negative views of the world, the future and the self. Such negative views make them more vulnerable to depression

Answer 11

Ellis proposed that depression occurs when an activating event (A) triggers an irrational belief (B) which in turn produces a consequence (C), i.e. an emotional response like depression. The key to this process in the irrational belief

Answer 12

Ellis said these are beliefs that are likely to interfere with a person's happiness. Such dysfunctional thoughts lead to mental disorders such as depression

Answer 13

A method for treating mental disorders based on both cognitive and behavioural techniques, such as challenging negative thoughts.

Answer 14

Ellis used vigorous argument to challenge irrational thoughts including seeking evidence for a persons thoughts then challenging this evidence.

Answer 15

Ellis used vigorous argument to challenge irrational thoughts including questioning the logic of a persons thoughts (do they make sense) then challenging this.

Answer 16

A perspective that emphasises the importance of physical processes in the body, such as genetic inheritance and neural function

Answer 17

A way of explaining a characteristic based on inherited traits through DNA

Answer 18

Candidate genes are specific genes that give a predisposition to a condition

Answer 19

When there are several alleles involved in the development of a trait, where the presence of each one increases the chances of the trait a little bit more

Answer 20

One group of genes cause a condition in some people, different groups of genes cause it in others. Also different genes might cause different types of OCD, e.g. hoarding.

Answer 21

The view that physical and psychological characteristics (e.g. OCD and schizophrenia) are determined by the behaviour of the nervous system, in particular the brain as well as individual neurons as well as the function of neurotransmitters.

Answer 22

Treatment involving medication, i.e. chemicals that have a particular effect on the functioning of the brain or some other body system. In the case of psychological disorders such drugs usually affect neurotransmitter levels

Answer 23

An inhibitory neurotransmitter thought to be linked with OCD - its chances of diffusion are increased by SSRIs

Answer 24

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. They stop serotonin being reabsorbed into the presynaptic nerve, so that it has another chance to diffuse into the receptors on the post synaptic nerve.

Answer 25

n example of an SSRI with a typical dose of between 20 and 60mg

Answer 26

An older type of antidepressant than SSRIs that work In a similar way but with more side effects e.g. clomipramine

Answer 27

Characteristics/ signs a person isn’t coping; observer discomfort, personal distress, maladaptive behaviour

Answer 28

Came up with the two-way process in explaining phobias, involving both classical conditioning for phobia initiation and operant conditioning for phobia maintenance.

Answer 29

Little Albert study

Answer 30

Compared treatments for phobias. Systematic and flooding both effective, but flooding slightly better.

Answer 31

Tested systematic desensitisation – three sessions, followed up three and 33 months later. Effective.

Answer 32

Developed the Negative Triad theory of depression, which states that sufferers have a negative view of themselves, the world and the future

Answer 33

Developed the ABC model for explaining depression, with A = activating event, B = belief about that event, and C = the consequence of that belief.

Answer 34

Compared the efficacy of CBT, antidepressants, and a combination. CBT and antidepressants both had an 81% success rate, whilst a combination had 86% success

Answer 35

Found that CBT was significantly less effective for people who have high levels of irrational beliefs

Answer 36

Found that those who were first-degree relatives of sufferers of OCD were 5x more likely to develop the condition than the general population

Answer 37

Definition used in clinical practice, e.g. Intellectual disability disorder. IQ of <70

Answer 38

Not always bad thing eg high IQ Social stigma from label, people could be living happy fulfilled life

Answer 39

antisocial personality disorder uses failure to conform to culturally accepted behaviour for diagnosis. This shows the criterion has usefulness in psychiatry.

Answer 40

Normsareculturallyrelative–Welabelothersaccordingto the standards of our cultural group e.g. hearing voices a norm in some cultures, labelled abnormal in UK . So, the definition is less useful for diagnosis for those who move between cultures.

Answer 41

Considers the patient’s perspective – whilst difficult to measure distress it acknowledges the patient’s experience is important and usefully gives a threshold for when to provide help.

Answer 42

It is hard to say if someone isn’t coping or just deviating form social norms. E.g. not having a job may be an alternative lifestyle choice, not a sign of FtFA. Involves subjective judgement

Answer 43

Covers a broad range of criteria so most reasons why someone would access mental health services. It provides a useful checklist for clinicians to assess others and against we can asses ourselves

Answer 44

Unrealistically high expectations – few people actually meet all johodas checklist

Answer 45

Application to therapy – phobia can be treated by preventing avoidance, e.g. Systematic desensitisation is effective for spiders (Gilroy et al.). Therefore the explanation is useful and likely accurate. ✓People can often remember a traumatic event. Particularly agoraphobics (Sue et al.) This shows how phobias result from bad experiences (conditioning).

Answer 46

Little Albert (Watson and Rayner) Procedure – Association of white rats (NS) with loud bang (UCS). Metal bar hit when presented with rat. Findings - White rats became a CS leading to fear (CR). Generalised to similar stimuli, e.g. white hairy objects.

Answer 47

Sometimes phobias develop with no trauma. Not all bad experiences lead to phobias. Di Nardo et al Dogs:

Answer 48

Supporting evidence for the role of genes. Twin studies e.g. Nestadt et al. found high concordance rate of 68% for MZ twins and lower for DZ twins 31%.

Answer 49

Environmental risk is also important as OCD often follows trauma. Cromer et al. found 54% of OCD suffers reported traumatic life events (TLE). Many who had the worse symptoms had multiple TLEs. A diathesis- stress may be better explanation. × There are too many candidate genes implicated in OCD to have predictive value. If we can’t use this knowledge to predict who will develop OCD as many genes are involved, the explanation is of limited usefulness. Though, it may help in developin

Answer 50

Application. Explanation has led to effective treatments. Antidepressants reduce OCD by increasing serotonin levels. 17 studies showed SSRIs more effective than placebos (Soomro et al.). Also supports the neural explanation

Answer 51

Serotonin OCD link may just be because patients are depressed. Patients with OCD often have depression (two illnesses at once is co-morbidity). Level of serotonin found in patients may relate to their depression and not their OCD. × Correlation doesn’t mean causation. As likely that OCD causes the abnormal functioning in brain areas rather than other way around, or a third factor causes both

Answer 52

Research support. Review of 17 studies showed SSRIs more effective than placebos (Soomro et al.) ✓Drugs are cheaper and non-disruptive to patients compared to alternatives e.g. CBT takes between 5-20 sessions and is expensive to the NHS.

Answer 53

Drugs have side effects, e.g. indigestion, blurred vision and loss of sex drive which may effect whether treatment continues. × OCD often follows trauma (Cromer et al.). As half of OCD patients had traumatic life events, it suggests an environmental cause, so questions use of biological treatments.

Answer 54

Musterbation, Utopianism

Answer 55

Good supporting evidence for the role of cognitions: Grazioli and Terry assessed 65 pregnant women for cognitive vulnerabilities. Those with faulty thoughts were more likely to develop post- natal depression later. Shows causation. ✓ R.W.A. Forms the basis of CBT (talking therapy). Therapist can challenge negative triad and patient can test it. Evidence shows CBT is effective -81% (March et al.). As changing thought processes is effective, it supports the role of thoughts in depression

Answer 56

Explains reactive depression but depression doesn’t always follow an event. Also, can’t explain symptoms like hallucinations. Matters as only a partial explanation × Ignores other explanations. E.g. Biological. We know that SSRIs which increase serotonin help depression which implies there is a role for the neurotransmitter.