Research Methods in Psychopathology Flashcards
4 demographics of a disorder
Prevalence (no. of ppl with a particular diagnosis at a particular time)
Lifetime Prevalence (no. of ppl who have experienced particular disorder at some point in their life)
Gender distribution
Age-of-Onset
4 reasons why demographics of a disorder are useful
- identifies trends on a large scale
- identifies cross-cultural differences
- identifies potential risk factors
- helps with allocation of resources, public health advice
4 limitations of demographics of a disorder
- can’t make conclusions about causation only correlation
- broad snapshot - only limited detail of info
- representative sample?
what are Questionnaire studies used to create
valid measures of disorder symptoms for clinical groups or for measuring sub-clinical traits in the normal population
questionnaire studies are also used for
to see how symptoms of different disorders may relate to each other, or to personality traits
3 reasons why questionnaire studies are useful
- Helps with accurate diagnosis
- Helps with accurate categorisation of disorders
- Identifies potential risk factors for future research
3 limitations of questionnaire studies
- Cannot make conclusions about causation only correlation
- Broad snapshot - only limited detail of information
what is phenomenology
what someone with a particular disorder actually experiences
why is phenomenology useful
- helpful when examining areas with little previous research
- can be a particularly useful first step in order to tailor later quantitative research
- good for assessing motivations, importance of different factors, quality of life etc.
what are the limitations of phenomenology
time consuming
what do experiments look for
potential causes or characteristics of disorders to gain greater understanding
can look at biological, psychological or social/environmental factors or combination of multiple
what are Retrospective Questionnaire Studies
Individuals are assessed for current psych disorder and asked to recall whether certain events have happened to them in the past
what do Retrospective Questionnaire Studies help us see
Allows us to see whether a history of negative life experiences is associated with developing a disorder
cons of Retrospective Questionnaire Studies
However, not entirely reliable -
Memory bias due to anxiety/depression can affect accuracy/detail of memory
Memory is imperfect
Memory for negative events may have been suppressed
Possibility of false memories
what is experimental psychopathology
One way to discover whether a variable may have a causal effect on a psychological disorder is to experimentally manipulate that variable in controlled conditions
This can be done using control ppts, to see if disorder-like symptoms can be induced
what did Webb & Davey (1993) want to find out
wanted to see if disgust was involved with fear of animals
Webb & Davey (1993) process and findings
First assessed ppts levels of fear of a number of animals
Then manipulated disgust by showing videos such as open-heart surgery
Then measured whether fear levels had changed
Found that fear of certain animals had increased following disgust-induction, suggesting that disgust is a causal factor
what can experimental psychopathology also see and example
if there are cognitive or behavioural differences between patient groups with different psychological disorders, or between a patient group and healthy controls
E.g. studies on response inhibition OCD compared with healthy controls
explain response inhibition OCD
Ppts are presented with rapid symbols on a computer screen, and have to respond with a button press when presented with a * on screen, and withhold response when presented with +
OCD patients find it harder to withhold a motor response than controls
Suggests that there’s a global inhibition deficit in OCD, which may be related to the occurrence of obsessions and compulsions
if we don’t have access to clinical groups, or if we want to conduct an experiment which may be unethical in clinical groups what can be used
analogue samples
what are Genetic Association Studies
Looks for a correlation between disease status and genetic variation
what are twin studies + info
Looks at similarities and differences between pairs of monozygotic twins compared with dizygotic twins
Monozygotic (identical) twins share 100% of their genes
Dizygotic (non-identical/fraternal) twins share approximately 50% of their genes
what is Heritability
how much of the variance of a trait is due to inherited genetic factors
When a trait differs between DZ twins but not MZ twins, it is genetic
Calculates how much a trait is due to genetic, environmental, or shared environmental factors
Somewhat problematic as it is statistical analysis based on certain assumptions
post-mortem studies
Studies abnormalities in patients’ brains after death
It was through this method that the amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles that characterise Alzheimer’s Disease were found
brain-imaging studies
Compare brain structure/function of patient groups with that of healthy controls
Structure: size or shape of regions
Function: how active particular regions are, either at rest or during tasks
Methods include MRI, fMRI, PET, EEG, MEG
in functional brain imaging experiments, we may use same sort of paradigms as…
experimental psychology
imaging genetics
Combines genetic and neuroimaging methods
Measures the effect of a gene on brain structure/function
Looks at the relationship with disorders
E.g. early impact of 5-HTTLPR polymorphism on the neural correlates of sadness
animal models
Sometimes ppl use animals as ppts instead of humans
Experimental studies, particularly behavioural
Emotion studies
Pharmacological studies, genetic studies, neuroimaging studies, post-mortem studies
treatment efficacy - randomised control trials
Compares groups of patients who are randomly allocated to either an experimental condition or a control condition (placebo)
Keeps all other factors constant to minimise bias
Good for testing efficacy of drugs, finding side-effects, controlling for placebo effect
what do MRI, fMRI, PET, EEG, MEG all stand for
- magnetic resonance imaging
- functional MRI
- positron emission tomography
- electroencephalogram
- magnetoencephalography
