Week 2 Part I Chapter 2 - Integrative Approach to Psychopathology Flashcards
What’s behind
psychological
disorders?
- Nature or nurture?
- Structural abnormalities in the brain?
- Chemical imbalance?
- Bad parenting?
- Bad life events?
- Poverty?
It’s all integrated!
No one thing creates a psychological disorder. - It’s a multidimensional integrated approach
One-Dimensional or
Multidimensional Models
One-dimensional model:
Attributes psychopathology to a one cause
- Not really applicable to psych
Multi-dimensional model:
Attributes psychopathology to multiple causes
What’s covered in this chapter? Where will we end up?
- Genetic
- Neural
- Behavioural and Cognitive
- Emotional
- Cultural, Social, and Interpersonal
- Lifespan Development
We will end up at the principal of equafinality: there are many different ways to get to the same spot
Genetic
Contributions to
Psychopathology
Genes
Genes: long molecules of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) at various locations on chromosomes
- Normal human cells have 23 pairs of chromosomes
No psychological disorder besides ——- disease is caused by a gene
- No psychological disorder besides Huntington’s disease is caused by a gene
- This is “polygeneic” - our thoughts and behaviours are influenced by many genes not just one.
Wrong ordering of molecules results in a defective gene may lead to problems (seen in Huntington Disease)
Genetic contributions to most psychological disorders are not typically this simple
Environmental factors affect whether genes are turned off or on
Polygenic:
behaviours are
influenced by many genes
Jim Springer and Jim Lewis
- Twins separated at birth
- 39 years apart
- Remarkable similarities
- There are no genes that predict our preferences or specific things
- Instead, this suggests that polygenic can predict certain traits that then increase the likelihood of encountering certain things
The Diathesis–Stress Model
- Diathesis (vulnerability): Inherited tendency towards a trait or behaviour
- Activated under conditions of stress in the environment
- Vulnerability: within us
- Stress: from environment
“The diathesis loads the gun the stress pulls the trigger”
Reciprocal Gene-Environment (Gene‒Environment
Correlation) Model
Genes may increase probability of experiencing stressful events
E.g., divorce
Genetic vulnerability leads to stressor triggers vulnerability disorder
Epigenetics:
Genes are turned “on” or “off” by environmental factors
(stress, nutrition, etc.)
This gene expression is then passed on from one generation to
next
Generational effects:
Education ability is more heritable now than in the past
Neural Contribution to psychopathology
Neuroscience Contributions
Centeral nervous system:
- Brain
- Spinal cord
- Peripheral
a. Autonomic nervous system
(energy)
a 1. Sympathetic nervous system (sympathizes for you and gives you energy)
a 2. Parasympathetic nervous system does the opposite
(both systems can’t be activated at the same time)
b.) Somatic nervous system - Central nervous system
The Structure of the Brain
Parts of the brain
Hindbrain
Cerebellum
Performs regulatory functions
Midbrain
Pons, medulla
Coordinates movements, relays
sensory information
Forebrain
Cerebrum
Performs higher functions like
thinking, perception, and planning
Cerebral Cortex
Re. psych disorders, most
research focuses on
frontal lobe of the
cerebral cortex (important for down regulating) as well as on the limbic system, the
hippocampus, and the
basal ganglia
every lobe has circuits
- Must know frontal lobe (where executor lives)
and temporal lobe (important for memory)
Lymbic system (commotion) and basal ganglia (motor movement)
Limbic system
Amydala: eye almonds help determine if what’s in your environment is “scary” or not
Hippocampus: sea horse
BAsal GAnglia
- important for movement
- parkinton’s disease
The neuron
- dendrites: takes in messages
- axon:
- Synaptic cleft:
Neurons never actually touch
- This is how drugs work in the brain.
Reuptake: When a neuron sends a neurotransmitter out and it gets set back to the same neuron
Sending neuron closes the doors.
Neurotransmitters
Common neurotransmitters
Glutamate (excitatory) and GABA (inhibitory) (they do opposite things)
Serotonin
Norepinephrine
Dopamine (reward neurotransmitter)
Drug therapies work by increasing or decreasing the flow of specific NTs
- Agonists: Increase activity of NT by mimicking effects
- Antagonists: ecrease/block NT
- Inverse agonists: produce effects opposite to those of NT
Glutamate and GABA
Glutamate: excitatory
Gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA): inhibitory
Reduces anxiety, arousal
Benzodiazepines (treat people with anxiety): make it easier for GABA molecules to attach to receptors.
- Gabba calms
Serotonin (5-HT)
Low serotonin
Instability, impulsivity,
tendency to overreact
Aggression, suicide,
overeating, excessive sexual
behaviour
Selective-serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)
Used to treat anxiety, mood, eating disorders
Norepinephrine
- adhd
- emergency reactions
Multiple pathways
contributing to multiple
behaviour processes
Wakefulness/sleep, attention
Emergency reaction
Dopamine (DA)
Associated with schizophrenia, addiction
Important for motor functions
Facilitates exploratory,
pleasure-seeking behaviour
Two major pathways:
- Nigrostriatal
Motor functioning
Parkinson’s (motor movements) - Mesolimbic
Reward
Addiction
Neural Contributions
Implications for Psychopathology
Psychological factors and experience can affect brain structure and function
E.g., Rats in an enriched environment
Idea that psychological disorders are “caused” by biochemical imbalances
or structural brain problems is an oversimplification
Behavioural Contributions:
Classical and operant
Conditioning= learning
Classical and operant conditioning facilitate learning relationships
among events
Classical conditioning & PTSD
ex. Getting jumped by someone in grey pants. Then getting scared every time you see grey pants.
Treatment: Gradual exposure.
- Classical and operant conditioning (consequences of what we do) facilitate learning relationships
among events
Operant conditioning & depression, anxiety, substance use disorders
Learned Helplessness (Martin Seligman)
- learn to be helpless as a result of doing something over and over without any reward or response.
ex. dog getting shocked no matter what it does
ex. systemic barriers
Having no control over what happens
Give up attempting to cope
Uncontrollable stress may lead to depression
“Learned optimism”: positive psychology
- learned helplessness in major depressive disorder
- if we can learn to be helpless we can learn to be optimistic
Social Learning (Albert Bandura)
People can learn through observing what happens to someone else following a behaviour: modelling or observational learning
Bobo doll experiments
- Can learn by observing
Cognitive biases
Negativity bias in depression, fear-related bias in anxiety
Rumination in depression
Unconscious or implicit cognition
Emotional Stroop
Eating disorders, depression, anxiety
Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy (CBT)
Popular model of therapy
- Aaron Beck
- The way that we think effects how we behave
Faulty attributions and attitudes associated with
thinking in anxiety, depression, stress
Attentional biases
Automatic thoughts due to maladaptive schema
Cognitive restructuring: restructure the
maladaptive schema
Behavioural tasks: exposure, increasing activity,
improving social skills
Emotions as composite
Emotions are best conceptualized as a composite:
1. A motor output
e.g., social approach
2. Autonomic activity
e.g., ↑ heart rate
3. Conscious experience
e.g., love, anger
Emotions mood and affect
Emotions: are neurally-based responses that facilitate
appropriate reactions to events
Influence evolutionary success
Emotions (right now): Short-lived responses to events/thoughts
Mood (extends over a longer period of time (ex. depression)):
-Diffuse emotional state that endures for longer.
Triggered without clear antecedent event/thought
Affect (another word for feeling or emotion)
- More general term encompassing effects of emotions, mood, etc.
Two main dimensions to
affective experience
- Arousal
- Valence
Gender Roles
Gender differences exist in rates of many psychological
disorders
Females internalizing
Males exsternalizing
Two-thirds with major depression are women
Men more likely to self-medicate
Societal pressure to hide anxious feelings
Pressures on women to be thin
Racism
Intergenerational trauma
Structural racism
Prior experience & distrust in the health system
Racism in psychological diagnosis
BIPOC individuals are more likely to be killed by police when called
to a mental health wellness check
Protective factors related to race/culture
Protective effects of social connectedness
- Longer life expectancy, lower risk of dementia
- Social phobia and depressive disorder related to (low) interpersonal
contacts - People tend to live longer with more social supports
Experiencing poverty
Increase risk of psychopathology
The Principle of Equifinality
“Different paths can result from the interaction of psychological
and biological factors during various stages of development.”
We conceptualize psychopathology in ….
An integrated way
Etiology
Cause
Is multiply determined
Heritability estimates
~50% of individual differences in personality and cognition are genetic
<50% variability of most psychological disorders
Heritability higher for some than others ( e.g., schizophrenia, bipolar
disorders)
Some groups of genes have been associated with
psychopathology
What are the two major dopamine pathways
Two major pathways:
- Nigrostriatal
Motor functioning
Parkinson’s (motor movements) - Mesolimbic
Reward
Addiction
5 multidimensional models
Behavioural
biological
emotional
developmental
social
