Psychotherapies

Question 1

What are the three general types of defense mechanisms?

Answer 1

mature (healthy and adaptive)
neurotic (in OCD, hysterical patients, severe stress)
immature (children, acolescents, psychotic patients)

Question 2

What are the 4 mature defense mechanisms?

Answer 2

altruism, humor, sublimation, and suppression

Question 3

Describe altruism.

Answer 3

performing acts that benefit others in order to vicariously experience pleasure

i.e. a woman who’s son recently died from cancer donates a large sum to help raise community awareness

Question 4

What defense mechanism is this: purposely ignoring an unacceptable impulse or emotion in order to diminish discomfort and accomplish a task

Answer 4

suppression

Question 5

What defense mechanism is this: satisfying social objectional impulses in an acceptable manner

Answer 5

sublimation

like a person with unconscious urges to physically control others becomes a prison guard

(ummmm…I don’t think this sounds like a healthy mature defense mechanism, but First Aid says it is)

Question 6

What are the 7 neurotic defense mechanisms?

Answer 6

1. controlling
2. displacement
3. intellectualization
4. isolation of affect
5. rationalization
6. reaction formation
7. repression

Question 7

What one is this: a physician dying from colon cancer describes the pathophysiology of his disease in great detail to his 12 yr-old son.

Answer 7

intellectualization - avoiding negative feelings by excessive use of intellectual functions and by focusin gon irrelevant details or inanimate objects

Question 8

What one is this: a student is angry at his mother and talks back to his teacher the next day.

Answer 8

displacement

shifting emotions from an undesirable situation to one that is personally tolerable

Question 9

What one is this: A women describes the recent death of her beloved husband without emotion.

Answer 9

isolation of affect

unconsciously limiting the experience of feelings or emotions associated with a stressful life event in order to avoid anxiety

Question 10

What one is this: “my boss fired me today because she’s short tempered and impulsive, not because I haven’t done a good job.”

Answer 10

rationalization

creating explanations of an event in order to justify outcomes or behaviors and to make them acceptable

Question 11

What one is this: A man who is in love with his married coworker insults her.

Answer 11

reaction formation

doing the opposite of an unacceptable impulse

Question 12

What is the difference between suppression and repression?

Answer 12

repression is the UNCONSCIOUS prevention of a thought of feeling from entering consciousness, whereas suppression is CONSCIOUS

Question 13

What are the 4 immature defenses?

Answer 13

acting out
denial
regression
projection

Question 14

What is this one: a man who has been told his therapist is going on vacation “forgets” his last appointment and skips it.

Answer 14

acting out

giving in to an impulse, even if socially inappropriate in order to avoid the anxiety of suppressing that impulse

[I’m not sure if I buy this one]

Question 15

What is this one: a woman who has been scheduled for a breast mass biopsy cancels her appointment because she believes she is healthy.

Answer 15

denial

not accepting a reality that is too painful

Question 16

What is this: a husband who is attracted to other women believes his wife is having an affair.

Answer 16

projection

attributing objectionable thoughts or emotions to others

Question 17

What is this: a woman brings her childhood teddy bear to the hospital when she has to spend the night.

Answer 17

regression

performing behaviors from an earlier stage of development in order to avoid tension associated with current phase of development

Question 18

What is this: “You and the nurses are the only people who understand me; all the other doctors are mean and impatient.”

Answer 18

splitting - labeling people as all good or all bad

Question 19

What is the general goal of psychoanalysis?

Answer 19

to resolve unconscious conflicts by bringing repressed experiences and feelings into awareness and integrating them into the patient’s conscious experience. So it’s insight oriented

Question 20

What are some important techniques/concepts used in psychoanalysis?

Answer 20

free association (whatever comes to mind)
dream interpretation
therapeutic alliance (bond between pt and therapist)
transference
countertransferance

Question 21

What is transference?

Answer 21

the projection of unconscious feelings about important figures in the patient’s life onto the therapist

interpretation is used to help the patient gain insight and resolve unconscious conflict

Question 22

What is countertransference?

Answer 22

the projection of unconscious feelings about important figures in the therapist’s life onto the patient

this can interfere with objectivity

Question 23

Which type of conditioning is it when you condition an unconscious response (often physiologic) to a given stimulus?

Answer 23

classical conditioning - this is Pavlov’s dog

Question 24

So what is operant conditioning then?

Answer 24

Behaviors can be learned when followed by a positive or negative reinforcement or punishment (skinner)

Question 25

What is the difference between positive reinforcement and negative reinforcement

Answer 25

positive reinforcement is giving a reward
negative reinforcement is taking away something aversive

both work to increase a behavior - reinforce a behavior

Question 26

What type of therapy is this: patient performs relaxation technique while being exposed to increasing doses of an anxiety-provoking stimulus. Gradually, he or she learns to associate the stimulus with a state of relaxation.

Answer 26

systemic desensitization

Question 27

What type of therapy is this: the patient is confronted with a real or imagined anxiety-provoking stimulus and is not allowed to withdraw form it until he or she feels calm an din control. Relaxation exercises are used to help them tolerate the stimulus. Often used to treat phobic disorders

Answer 27

flooding (if the stimulus is real) or implosion (if the stimulus is imagined)

Question 28

What type of therapy is this: a negative stimulus (such as an electric shock) is repeatedly paired with a specific behavior to create an unpleasant response. commonly used to treat addictions or parpahilias.

Answer 28

aversion therapy

Question 29

What type of therapy is this: rewards are given after specific behaviors to positively reinforce them. Commonly used to encourage showering, shaving and other positive behaviors in disorganized or mentally retarded individuals.

Answer 29

token economy

Question 30

What type of therapy is this: physiological data (such as heart rate and BP) are given to patients as they try to mentally control physiological states. Common used to treat migraines, hypertension, chronic pain, asthma and incontinence.

Answer 30

biofeedback

Question 31

What is the primary goal of cognitive therapy?

Answer 31

seeks to correct faulty assumptions and negative feelings by teaching patients to identify their maladaptive thoughts and replace them with positive ones

most commonly used to treat depression and anxiety disorders

Question 32

What are the four logistical types of couples therapy?

Answer 32

conjoint - one therapist sees couple together
concurrent - one therapist sees couple separately
collaborative - each person has their own therapist that work together
four-way - two therapists see the couple together