Treating Psychological Disorders Flashcards
psychological assessment
an evaluation of the patient’s psychological and mental health
psychotherapy
the professional treatment for psychological disorder through techniques designed to encourage communication of conflicts and insight
fundamental aspect of psychotherapy is that the patient directly confronts the disorder and works with the therapist to help reduce it
Psychodynamic therapy (psychoanalysis)
a psychological treatment based on Freudian and neo-Freudian personality theories in which the therapist helps the patient explore the unconscious dynamics of personality
goal of the psychotherapy is for the patient to talk about his or her personal concerns and anxieties, allowing the therapist to try to understand the underlying unconscious problems that are causing the symptoms
process of interpretation
allowing the therapist to try to understand the underlying unconscious problems that are causing the symptoms
therapist uses the patient’s expressed thoughts to try to understand the underlying unconscious problems. The analyst may try out some interpretations on the patient and observe how he or she responds to them
free association
therapist listens while the client talks about whatever comes to mind, without any censorship or filtering
therapist then tries to interpret these free associations, looking for unconscious causes of symptoms
dream analysis
analyze the symbolism of the dreams in an effort to probe the unconscious thoughts of the client and interpret their significance
insight
an understanding of the unconscious causes of the disorder
resistance
using defense mechanisms to avoid the painful feelings in his or her unconscious
transference
the patient unconsciously redirects feelings experienced in an important personal relationship toward the therapist
humanistic therapy
a psychological treatment based on the personality theories of Carl Rogers and other humanistic psychologists
based on the idea that people develop psychological problems when they are burdened by limits and expectations placed on them by themselves and others, and the treatment emphasizes the person’s capacity for self-realization and fulfillment
attempt to promote growth and responsibility by helping clients consider their own situations and the world around them and how they can work to achieve their life goals
person-centered therapy (or client-centered therapy)
an approach to treatment in which the client is helped to grow and develop as the therapist provides a comfortable, nonjudgmental environment
therapeutic alliance
a relationship between the client and the therapist that is facilitated when the therapist is genuine (i.e., he or she creates no barriers to free-flowing thoughts and feelings), when the therapist treats the client with unconditional positive regard (i.e., values the client without any qualifications, displaying an accepting attitude toward whatever the client is feeling at the moment), and when the therapist develops empathy with the client (i.e., that he or she actively listens to and accurately perceives the personal feelings that the client experiences)
Cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT)
a structured approach to treatment that attempts to reduce psychological disorders through systematic procedures based on cognitive and behavioral principles
based on the idea that there is a recursive link among our thoughts, our feelings, and our behavior
CBT treats the symptoms of the disorder (the behaviors or the cognitions) and does not attempt to address the underlying issues that cause the problem. The goal is simply to stop the negative cycle by intervening to change cognition or behavior.
Behavioral therapy
psychological treatment that is based on principles of learning
direct approach is through operant conditioning using reward or punishment
Exposure therapy
a behavioral therapy based on the classical conditioning principle of extinction, in which people are confronted with a feared stimulus with the goal of decreasing their negative emotional responses to it
flooding
client is exposed to the source of his fear all at once
Systematic desensitization
a behavioral treatment that combines imagining or experiencing the feared object or situation with relaxation exercises
counterconditioning
a second incompatible response (relaxation, e.g., through deep breathing) is conditioned to an already conditioned response (the fear response).
Aversion therapy
a type of behavior therapy in which positive punishment is used to reduce the frequency of an undesirable behavior
An unpleasant stimulus is intentionally paired with a harmful or socially unacceptable behavior until the behavior becomes associated with unpleasant sensations and is hopefully reduced
cognitive therapy
a psychological treatment that helps clients identify incorrect or distorted beliefs that are contributing to disorder
changing thoughts will change emotions, and that the new emotions will then influence behavior
Aaron T. Beck and the psychologist Albert Ellis
rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT) or rational emotive therapy (RET)
focused on pointing out the flaws in the patient’s thinking. Ellis noticed that people experiencing strong negative emotions tend to personalize and overgeneralize their beliefs, leading to an inability to see situations accurately
therapist’s goal is to challenge these irrational thought patterns, helping the patient replace the irrational thoughts with more rational ones, leading to the development of more appropriate emotional reactions and behaviors
develop a short-term therapy for depression that would modify these unproductive thoughts
challenges the client to test his beliefs against concrete evidence
eclectic therapy
an approach to treatment in which the therapist uses whichever techniques seem most useful and relevant for a given patient
most common form of therapy used
dialectical behavioral therapy
example of an eclectic treatment approach that has been shown to be successful in treating BPD
essentially a cognitive therapy, but it includes a particular emphasis on attempting to enlist the help of the patient in his or her own treatment
Biomedical therapies
treatments designed to reduce psychological disorder by influencing the action of the central nervous system
psychostimulants
for ADHD; Ritalin, Adderall, and Dexedrine
Antidepressant medications
drugs designed to improve moods
work by influencing the production and reuptake of neurotransmitters that relate to emotion, including serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine
tricyclic antidepressants and monamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs)
work by increasing the amount of serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine at the synapses, but they also have severe side effects including potential increases in blood pressure and the need to follow particular diets
selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)
Prozac, Paxil, and Zoloft, which are designed to selectively block the reuptake of serotonin at the synapse, thereby leaving more serotonin available in the CNS. SSRIs are safer and have fewer side effects than the tricyclics or the MAOIs
mood stabilizing medications
lithium carbonate (or “lithium”), was approved by the FDA in the 1970s for treating both manic and depressive episodes, and it has proven very effective
Potential negative side effects of lithium are loss of coordination, slurred speech, frequent urination, and excessive thirst
Antianxiety medications
drugs that help relieve fear or anxiety
work by increasing the action of the neurotransmitter GABA. The increased level of GABA helps inhibit the action of the sympathetic division of the autonomic nervous system, creating a calming experience
tranquilizers, known as benzodiazepines
most common class of antianxiety medications;
Antipsychotic drugs (neuroleptics)
drugs that treat the symptoms of schizophrenia and related psychotic disorders
reduce the positive symptoms of schizophrenia by reducing the transmission of dopamine at the synapses in the limbic system, and they improve negative symptoms by influencing levels of serotonin
can cause tardive dyskinesia that causes uncontrollable muscle movements, usually in the mouth area
Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT)
a medical procedure designed to alleviate psychological disorder in which electric currents are passed through the brain, deliberately triggering a brief seizure
used to treat sever depresion
transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)
a medical procedure designed to reduce psychological disorder that uses a pulsing magnetic coil to electrically stimulate the brain
Psychosurgery
surgery that removes or destroys brain tissue in the hope of improving disorder,
for most sever cases
prefrontal lobotomy
destroys the connections between the prefrontal cortex and the rest of the brain
Group therapy
psychotherapy in which clients receive psychological treatment together with others.
Primary prevention
prevention in which all members of the community receive the treatment
Secondary prevention
more limited and focuses on people who are most likely to need it—those who display risk factors for a given disorder
Implicit Association Test (IAT)
designed to assess the strength of a person’s mental associations between death and the self
participants classified stimuli representing the constructs of “death” (i.e., die, dead, deceased, lifeless, and suicide) and “life” (i.e., alive, survive, live, thrive, and breathing) and the attributes of “me” (i.e., I, myself, my, mine, and self) and “not me” (i.e., they, them, their, theirs, and other)
community health service programs
act during childhood or early adolescence with the hope that interventions might prevent disorders from appearing or keep existing disorders from expanding. The prevention provided can be primary, secondary, or tertiary
tertiary prevention
such as psychotherapy or biomedical therapy, that focuses on people who are already diagnosed with disorder
outcome research
studies that assess the effectiveness of medical treatments, used to determine the effectiveness of different therapies
the independent variable is the type of the treatment
dependent measure is an assessment of the benefit received by the client
Nonspecific treatment effects
occur when the patient gets better over time simply by coming to therapy, even though it doesn’t matter what actually happens at the therapy sessions
meta-analysis for effectiveness of therapy
a statistical technique that uses the results of existing studies to integrate and draw conclusions about those studies
found that the average effect size for the influence of therapy was 0.85, indicating that psychotherapy had a relatively large positive effect on recovery. What this means is that, overall, receiving psychotherapy for behavioral problems is substantially better for the individual than not receiving therapy
a good part of the effect of therapy is nonspecific, in the sense that simply coming to any type of therapy is helpful in comparison to not coming
community interventions can be effective in preventing a variety of psychological disorders
effect size
a measure of the effectiveness of treatment
empirically supported therapies
cognitive therapy and behavioral therapy for depression; cognitive therapy, exposure therapy, and stress inoculation training for anxiety; CBT for bulimia; and behavior modification for bed-wetting
