Treatment of Psychological Disorders (15)

Question 1

Psychotherapy

Answer 1

The generic name given to formal psychological treatment. All forms involve interactions between practitioners and client. Aimed at helping the patient understand their symptoms and problems and providing solutions for them.
One limitation – some psychological disorders are characterised by apathy or indifference and individuals may not be interested in being treated.
May be more effective for some disorders over the long term.

Question 2

Biological therapies

Answer 2

Treatement of psychological disorders based on medical approaches to disease (what is wrong with body) and to illness (what a person feels as a result). Based on notion that psychological disorders result from abnormalities in neural and bodily processes. Eg. imbalance in specific neurotransmitters or a malfunction in a particular brain region.
Treatment ranges from drugs to electrical stimulation of brain regions to surgical intervention.
One limitation – long-term success may require the person to continue treatment, sometimes indefinitely.

Question 3

Insight

Answer 3

The goal of psychoanalysis; a client’s awareness of their own unconscious psychological processes and how these processes affect daily functioning. By gaining insight, the client is freed from these unconscious influences. According to psychoanalysis, the client’s symptoms diminish as a result of reducing unconscious conflicts.
Evidence is weak for its effectiveness in treating most psychological disorders.

Question 4

Psychodynamic therapy

Answer 4

A form of therapy based on Freudian theory; it aims to help clients examine needs, defences, motives as a way of understanding distress. Includes exploring the clinet’s avoidance of distressing thoughts, looking for recurring themes and patterns in thoughts and feelings, discussing early traumatic experiences, focusing on interpersonal relations and childhood attachments, emphasising the relationship with the therapist, and exploring fantasies, dreams and daydreams.
Some new, shorter approaches emerging.
Not clear whether psychodynamic aspects are superior to other brief forms of therapy.

Question 5

Behaviour therapy

Answer 5

Treatment based on the premise that behaviour is learned and therefore can be unlearned through the use of classical and operant conditioning.
Operant conditioning – desired behaviour are rewarded, unwanted behaviours are ignored or punished.
Eg. treatment centres use token economies.
Client learns behaviour through modelling. Its successful use (eg. social skills training) is itself rewarding and reinforcing.

Question 6

Exposure

Answer 6

A behavioural therapy technique that involves repeated exposure to an anxiety-producing stimulus or situation. Based on classical conditioning. By confronting feared stimulus in the absence of negative consequences, the person learns new, nonthreatening associations.
Most effective treatment for anxiety or fear psychopathology.

Question 7

Cognitive therapy

Answer 7

Treatment based on the idea that distorted thoughts produce maladaptive behaviours and emotions; treatment strategies attempt to modify these though patterns, thus eliminating the maladaptive behaviours and emotions.

Question 8

Cognitive restructuring

Answer 8

A therapy that strives to help clients recognise maladaptive thought patterns and replace them with ways of viewing the world that are more in tune with reality. (Aaron Beck)

Question 9

Cognitive-Behavioural therapy (CBT)

Answer 9

A therapy that incorporates techniques from cognitive therapy and behaviour therapy. Tries to correct the client’s faulty cognitions and to train the client to engage in new behaviours.
Most widely used version of psychotherapy, one of the most effective forms for many types of psychological disorders, especially anxiety and depressive disorders.

Question 10

Client-centred therapy

Answer 10

An empathetic approach to therapy; it encourages people to fulfil their individual potentials through greater self-understanding. Based on humanistic theory.
Key ingredient is to create a safe and comforting setting for clients to access their true feelings.
Therapists stive to be genuine and empathic, to take the client’s perspective, and to accept the client through unconditional positive regard. Helps client focus on their subjective experience.
Therapists use reflective listening.

Question 11

Expressed emotion

Answer 11

A pattern of negative action’s by a client’s family members; the pattern includes critical comments, hostility directed towards the person by family members, and emotional overinvolvement (overprotective, pitying, exaggerated response to disorder). The level of expressed emotion from family members corresponds to the relapse rate for those with schizophrenia.
Highest if great deal of contact with family.

Question 12

Psychotropic medications

Answer 12

Drugs that affect mental processes; they act by changing brain neurochemistry. Eg. they inhibit action potentials, or alter synaptic transmission to increase or decrease the action of particular neurotransmitters. 3 categories: anti-anxiety drugs, antidepressants, and antipsychotics.
Sometimes drugs from one category are used to treat a disorder from another category – one reason is comorbidity. Another reason is insufficient evidence for why they are effective, so trial and error.

Question 13

Anti-anxiety drugs

Answer 13

A class of psychotropic medications used for the treatment of anxiety, short term. 
Benzodiazepines (eg. Xanax or Antivan), which increase the activity of GABA, the most pervasive inhibitory neurotransmitter. Promote relaxation and reduce anxiety, but are highly addictive. 
Sleeping pills (Ambien or Lunestra) also produced their effects through BAGA receptors; bind mainly with receptors that induce sleep rather than relaxation.

Question 14

Antidepressants

Answer 14

Drugs used primarily to treat depression, but also often used for other disorders.
Monoamine oxidase (MOA) inhibitors stop process of MOA breaking down serotonin, norepinephrine and dopamine in the synapse. So, they result in more of those neurotransmitters being available in the synapse.
Tricyclic antidepressants inhibit reuptake of mainly serotonin and norepinephrine, resulting in more of each being available in the synapse.
Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) inhibit the reuptake of serotonin.

Question 15

Antipsychotics

Answer 15

Drugs used for treatment of schizophrenia and other disorders that involve psychosis. Reduce symptoms such as delusions and hallucinations. Traditional ones are dopamine antagonists that bind to dopamine receptors, thus blocking the effects of dopamine.
Not always effective, have significant side effects (tardive dyskinesia). Do not treat negative symptoms of schizophrenia.

Question 16

Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT)

Answer 16

A procedure that involves administering a strong electrical current to the person’s brain to produce a seizure; it is effective for some cases of severe depression. It works quickly but has a high relapse rate and memory impairment.

Question 17

Placebo effect

Answer 17

An improvement in physical or mental health following treatment with placebo – that is, with a drug or treatment that has no active component om the disorder being treated.
Participant must believe it will work.
Those that also produce minor physical reactions that people associate with drug effects produce the strongest placebo effects.
The neural processes involved in responding to placebo are similar to those activated in response to biologically active treatment.

Question 18

Dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT)

Answer 18

A form of therapy used to treat borderline personality disorder that combines elements of the behavioural and cognitive treatments with a mindfulness approach based on Eastern meditative practices. Has 3 stages.

1. therapist targets most extreme and dysfunctional bheavoiurs. Focus on replacing these with more appropriate ones; learning problems solving and emotional coping techniques.
2. therapist helps person explore past traumatic experiences that may be cause of emotional problems.
3. therapist helps person develop self-respect and problem solving.

Question 19

Applied behavioural analysis (ABA)

Answer 19

An intensive treatment for autism, based on operant conditioning.