Week 1: Thinking About And Researching Distress And Mental Health

Question 1

What is abnormality and its clear indicators?

Answer 1

• no consensus definition
• clear indicators: suffering, maladaptive behaviour, deviancy, social discomfort, dangerousness

Question 2

What are the advantages and disadvantages of classification?

Answer 2

• advantages: provides nomenclature, common language, structure of information, facilitate research, define the domain of what is considered pathological
• disadvantages: loss of individual information, stigma and stereotyping associated with diagnoses, self-concept impact by diagnostic labelling

Question 3

How does culture affect what is abnormal?

Answer 3

• some forms of psychopathology highly specific to certain cultures
• varies in the way different culture describe psychological distress
• can shape the clinical presentation of disorders

Question 4

What are prevalence and incidence?

Answer 4

• prevalence: the number of active cases in a population during any given period of time, expressed in percentages
• the number of new cases in population over given period of time, typically lower than prevalence

Question 5

What are the different types of research design?

Answer 5

• correlational: retrospective (looking back in time), prospective (looking ahead of time), longitudinal design (group of people over time): D - cannot make causal inferences, A - does not require manipulation of variables
• experimental research design