Psychophysiological Disorders and Health Psychology Flashcards
psychophysiological disorders
- genuine physical illness with identifiable medical explanations in which psychological factors play a significant role (ex consider the link between high blood pressure and stress; in general, you’d be hard pressed to find an illness that stress doesn’t make worse)
- formerly known as psychosomatimc disorders (in which the psyche/mind is having an unfavourable effect on the some/body)
- are in contrast to somatic symptom disorders
- important to remember that there is a nature vs nurture interplay in physical health conditions too
somatic symptom disorders
- also called somatoform disorders
- physical symptoms without identifiable medical explanations, manifestation of psychological problems
behavioural medicine
- interdisciplinary field of behavioural science as applied to the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of medical problems
- based upon the mind-body link and prevention is a key component
health psychology
- study of psychological factors that promote and maintain health
- based upon the mind-body link and prevention is a key component
CVD
(cardiovascular disease)
-an excellent example of a psychophysiological disorder; a genuine physical disease with a medical explanation, but in which psychological factors play a huge role
-about 45% of all deaths are somehow related to cardiovascular functioning
-CVD is the leading cause of death in Canada
-behaviours such as smoking, lack of exercise, poor diet and alcohol can promote CVD
-CVD can be minimized by altering lifestyle
-mental health also impacts ability to cope; worry an anxiety can lead to CVD
-mood disorders are also more present with chronic illness
(overall, brain physiological and psychological wellbeing can impact the rest of health)
stress
of all the biological, psychological and social factors that impact physical heath, stress is the major one
- occurs in response to our environment
- can be thought of in terms of stressors (stimuli one finds stressful) and response (coping, emotional upset/calmness)
hans seyle’s General Adaptation Syndrome
- also called the stress response
- alarm phase (ANS fight/flight response), resistance phase (damage occurs or organism adapts to stress and the flooding or cortisol), exhaustion phase (organism suffers irreversible damage)
- seyle notice that rats who sustained stress from injection of saline or chemicals would develop ulcers in adrenal glands (phase 1 in and of itself could produce ulcers in rats, phase 2 depends on coping, duration, intensity and adaptability
nervous system
- CNS (brain and spinal cord)
- PNS (connects CNS to the organs, limbs and everything else)
- PSN further subdivided into somatic (motor and sensory function) and autonomic (sympathetic: flight/flight, activated by stress; parasympathetic: rest and digest, suppressed by stress)
stressor categorization
- major vs minor (death of loved one vs stuck in traffic)
- acute vs chronic (failing an exam vs unpleasant workload); should take into account allostatic load (amount of wear and tear in the body from chronic physiological stress)
- psychogenic vs neurogenic (self-induced (worry, anxiety) vs physical stress (ex from an injury))
- controllable/predictable vs uncontrollable/unpredictable (it’s easier to come with things you can see coming)
stress: accounting for individual differences
- people respond to events differently, largely because people perceive events differently; not every one of say 100 ppl who see something tragic will react the same, or associate the same meaning with the event)
- not all ppl have the same resources/coping strats
- we all have stressors, and some of them are needed (like to wake up in the morning and get things done) but a lot of the unpredictable, devastating stress might be subjective (depending upon whether one perceives it as really unpredictable)
coping
- the major kinds/fundamental approaches are problem-focuses or emotion focuses
- problem/solution focused (in which the indv takes direct, head-on action to solve a problem or seek a solution) is the most adaptive when the indv can actually do something about the situation (p useless way to cope with say someone being dead tho)
- emotion focused (addressing the response to the problem instead of the problem itself by taking efforts to reduce negative emotional rxns to a stressor) is most adaptive when the sitch is uncomfortable and there’s no direct solution to the stressor
- studies show that unhealthy coping mechs, such as denial and avoidance, are the lest effective strats (over the long term)
goodness of fit hypothesis
-the adaptability of a particular coping response depends on how ideal the match is btw the situation and what’s ideally required in the coping method selected (ex, emotional focused coping such as mourning won’t help world leaders solve coronavirus, but problem focused coping isn’t a great way to mourn a lost loved one)
social readjustment rating scale
- measurement of stress by psychiatrists thomas holmes and richard rahe
- consists of 43 life events to which scores called “life change units” are assigned; if score exceeds 300, the indv is at risk for an illness
- not perfect, and bases on questionable retrospective self-report research, but in spite of that is actually pretty predictive; see correlation btw total scores and illness such as heat attack, onset of leukemia, colds/flus
- psychological factors such as perceptions and cognition, as well as how an indv responds and reacts to stress may also contribute to onset of illness
assessment of daily experiences
- measure of stress created by stone and neale that considers it may not be that the devastating life events that really matter so much as the chronic daily grind
- indvs rated a nd reported daily experiences at the end of each day (relating to work, family, finances, etc)
- observed that an increase in undesirable events and decrease in desirable events preceded respiratory infections
daily hassles scale
- a measurement of stress based upon the connection between daily hassles and poor psychological and physiological adjustment
- crude, but predictive