Psychopathology: phobias

Question 1

What is a phobia?

Answer 1

Excessive fear and anxiety, triggered by an object, place or situation
There are three type of phobia: specific, social, and agoraphobia

Question 2

What is a specific phobia?

Answer 2

phobia of an object (such as an animal or body part) or of a situation (such as having an injection or flying)

Question 3

What is a social phobia?

Answer 3

phobia of a social situation, such as public speaking or using a public toilet

Question 4

What is agoraphobia?

Answer 4

phobia of being outside or in a public space

Question 5

What are the behavioural characteristics of phobias?

Answer 5

Panic
- may involve crying, screaming or running away in response to the phobic stimulus
Avoidance
- may go to a lot of effort to avoid a phobic stimulus altogether, which can interfere greatly with their life
Endurance
- when a person chooses to remain in the presence of a phobic stimulus and keep a wary eye on it

Question 6

What are the cognitive characteristics of phobias?

Answer 6

Selective attention to stimulus
- people think we have the best chance of reacting quickly to a threat when paying attention
Irrational beliefs
- unfounded thoughts towards a phobic stimulus that have no basis in reality
Cognitive distortions
- perceptions may be inaccurate and unrealistic

Question 7

What are the emotional characteristics of phobias?

Answer 7

Anxiety
- unpleasant state of high arousal, prevents relaxation or experiencing positive emotion
Fear
- immediate unpleasant response when encountering phobic stimulus, more intense and shorter lasting than anxiety
Unreasonable emotion
- much greater and more disproportionate than usual, strong, irrational response

Question 8

Outline the behavioural approach to explaining phobias

Answer 8

The behavioural approach focuses on the role of learning in the process of acquiring a phobia. It involves the two process model, which states that a phobia is acquired by classical conditioning, and maintained by operant conditioning.

Question 9

What is classical conditioning?

Answer 9

it involves learning to associate something of which we initially have no fear (a neutral stimulus) with something that already triggers a fear response (an unconditioned stimulus).

Question 10

How was Little Albert’s phobia acquired through classical conditioning?

Answer 10

When shown a white rat (neutral stimulus), researchers made a loud banging sound (unconditioned stimulus) which creates an unconditioned response of fear. When the NS and the UCS are encountered close together in time, the NS becomes associated with the UCS and both now produce a fear response. The rat is now a conditioned stimulus that produces a conditioned response

Question 11

what is operant conditioning?

Answer 11

This takes place when our behaviour is reinforced or punished. Reinforcement increases the frequency of a behaviour, such as avoidance behaviour, which means that phobias are maintained through operant conditioning, since avoidance behaviour negatively reinforces this behaviour

Question 12

What is negative reinforcement?

Answer 12

When an individual avoids a situation that is likely to be unpleasant, which results in a desirable consequence

Question 13

What is positive reinforcement?

Answer 13

Adding a reward or positive consequence to increase/encourage a desired behaviour

Question 14

What are some positives of using the behavioural approach to explain phobias?

Answer 14

• can be used to develop treatments for phobias
• there is evidence for a link between bad experiences and phobias
• Ad De Jongh found that 73% of people with a fear of dental treatment had experienced a traumatic experience

Question 15

What are some negatives of using the behavioural approach to explain phobias?

Answer 15

• it doesn’t account for or offer an adequate explanation for the cognitive aspects of phobias
• not all phobias appear following a bad experience, and not all bad experiences lead to a phobia
• some phobias could also be explained through evolutionary theory, things that may have posed a threat in our evolutionary past

Question 16

What is systematic desensitisation?

Answer 16

It’s a behavioural therapy designed to gradually reduce phobic anxiety, if a person can learn to relax in the presence of a phobic stimulus, they will be cured

Question 17

How does systematic desensitisation work?

Answer 17

There are three processes involved in SD
- the anxiety hierarchy, where the client and therapist create a list of situations relating to a phobic stimulus and rank them in terms of most to least anxiety inducing
- relaxation, where the therapist teaches the client to relax as deeply as possible, as reciprocal inhibition means that it’s impossible to be afraid and relaxed at the same time
- exposure, when the client is gradually exposed to the stimulus, working up the anxiety hierarchy and staying relaxed throughout the

Question 18

What are some positives of SD?

Answer 18

• evidence of effectiveness
• Lisa Gilroy et al. followed up 42 people who had SD and found that they were less fearful than a control group when tested 3 months after, then also 33 months after
• SD is suitable for people with learning difficulties, as it is less distressing than alternatives

Question 19

What are some negatives of SD?

Answer 19

• it only treats symptoms, not underlying causes

Question 20

What is flooding?

Answer 20

• involves immediately exposing people to their phobic stimulus, without a gradual build up
• requires fewer, but longer sessions than SD

Question 21

How does flooding work?

Answer 21

• stops phobic responses very quickly
• doesn’t give the option of avoidance, meaning the client quickly learns that the stimulus is harmless
• a learned response is extinguished when the conditioned stimulus is encountered without the conditioned stimulus
• the client achieves relaxation in the presence of the stimulus when they become so exhausted by the fear response
• clients give fully informed consent prior to this

Question 22

What are some positives of flooding?

Answer 22

• it’s very cost effective, as it is clinically effective and inexpensive
• it is only necessary to have a few long sessions before the phobia is cured

Question 23

What are some negatives of flooding?

Answer 23

• it is a highly unpleasant experience that provokes tremendous anxiety
• dropout rates are significantly higher than for SD