Exam 4 Content - Psych

psychological abnormality

is categorized this way if:

1) non-normative/violating social norms

2) causes unusual discomfort

3) causes the individual to be unable to function in society

4) causes the individual to be dangerous to oneself or others

essentially when the brain causes problems to the individual or to society

Diagnostic and Statistic Manual of Mental Disorders V

the legal diagnostic manual of psychological disorders; often used to determine insurance reimbursements; most require having 5/9 symptoms to be diagnosed with the disorder

psychology student syndrome

the tendency of students studying psychology to diagnose oneself and their close relations; many psychological traits follow a normal curve, and disorders are conceptualized as being too high or too low on an otherwise normal trait

phobias

a psychological disorder that includes symptoms of dizziness, trembling, increased heart rate, breathlessness, nausea, a sense of unreality, fear of dying, and a preoccupation with a fear object; is highly treatable through exposure therapy, with 90% showing reduced symptoms and 65% being cured 4 years post

specific phobia

a psychological disorder that affects ~9% of the population; the acute fear of a particular object/person/situation

social anxiety disorder

also known as social phobia, is the fear of being socially judged; affects 5-7% of the population

panic disorder

a psychological disorder that recurring panic attacks; people often think that they are dying, resulting in them believing they are having a heart attack

generalized anxiety disorder

a psychological disorder that causes excessive worrying, typically about highly improbable outcomes; cognitive biases include magnification/minimization, catastrophizing, overgeneralization, jumping to conclusions, and splitting/all or nothing thinking (“relationship poison”); an individual can become more prone to these cognitive biases depending on their situation

obsessive compulsive disorder

a psychological disorder that occurs when an individual has recurring cognitive obsessions that cause repetitive behavioral compulsions that are often debilitating; is correlated to being higher in conscientiousness

post traumatic stress disorder

a psychological disorder that involves increased sensitivity to fear-induced stimuli (correlating to a hyperactive amygdala); can occur 6+ months post trauma and can increase future risk of dementia; is diagnosed 1+ months post trauma and requires for symptoms to last for at least 1 month

predictive factors include genetics, social support, continuous safe environments post trauma, absence of prior trauma, and cognitive factors

30-40% recover within a year without treatment, and 50-70% recover with evidence-based treatment, overall 40-70% achieve remission

recovery is influence by early intervention, strong social support, younger age trauma, and absence of co-morbid conditions

acute stress disorder

increased sensitivity to fear inducing stimuli from 3 days to 1 month post trauma; symptoms must last 3 days with an emphasis on dissociative symptoms; 50% go on to develop PTSD; is used to flag people at risk for PTSD to target them for treatment

delayed onset PTSD

as opposed to immediate onset PTSD, is PTSD that occurs 6+ months post trauma; makes up 15-20% of cases; can be due to new stressors, new circumstances, and loss of social support

tetris study

a psychological study performed in 2009 on people who had just seen traumatic images; they were randomly assigned to do nothing or play tetris

people who played tetris were less likely to develop intrusive thoughts; lack of replication and testing in the real-world

dissociative identity disorder

a psychological disorder where an individual has multiple personalities; is theorized to occur as a means of protecting oneself from trauma

2012 study showed cases rose and fell with cultural events, and that the number of alters (personalities) tended to increase with therapy

bipolar disorder

a mood disorder characterized by intense mood fluctuations; are three different types

bipolar 1

a type of psychological disorder when an individual has at least 1 manic episode for at least 7 days; includes being abnormally/persistently elevated, expansive enthusiasm/optimism, irritable mood; can require hospitalization to protect the individual from self harm from psychotic features; does not require depressive episodes, though they are common

expansive mood

excessive enthusiasm/optimism; inflated self esteem/believing oneself to be more important, overly social/outgoing behavior, increased goal directed activity and impulsivity

bipolar 2

a type of psychological disorder where depressive episodes last for at least 2 weeks along with hypomanic episodes; mania in this diagnosis is less intense and depressive episodes are required

cyclothymic disorders

a type of psychological disorder that involved numerous periods of hypomanic symptoms and periods of depressive symptoms for at least 2 years; symptoms do not meet the full requirements for hypomanic and depressive episodes

antisocial personality disorder

also psychopathy, characterized by selfish, impulsive, dishonest, aggressive, unreliable, law-breaking, risky behavior with sex and drugs; physiological trait of an underactive amygdala; do not experience fear, pain, and anxiety well

borderline personality disorder

characterized by impulsivity, unstable sense of self, fear of abandonment, swinging judgements of close relations; has more frequent mood swings, feelings of emptiness; can be treated with dialectal behavioral theory

major depressive disorder

requires at least two weeks of 5 symptoms including 1 core symptom:

core: depressive mood, diminished interest/pleasure

symptoms: increased or decreased weight or appetite, insomnia or hypersomnia, psychomotor agitation or retardation, fatigue, worthlessness or guilt, decreased concentration, suicidal thoughts

heterogeneous in terms of symptom severity, underlying causes and comorbidity

risk factors include genetics, social/environmental stressors, early life trauma, chronic inflammation, neuroendocrine dysregulation

many also experience anxiety and substance use

Fried and Nesse 2015

a study that studied depression symptoms in 3703 using a population depression scale

found 1030 different depression profiles with the most common only being in 1.8%, and 501 had unique profiles

inconsistent fMRI trackers

SSRI

a type of drug that can be used to treat MDD; shows significant benefit over placebos, but not dramatically; placebo effect may also correlate to people seeking treatment during one of the lowest points of their life, life tends to correct over time; 8 weeks typically required to determine non-response

side effects are common (38%) and include sexual dysfunction, drowsiness/sleepiness, weight gain, nausea, and insomnia

SSRI discontinuation syndrome

occurs in ~15% after discontinuing SSRIs, can last from 2 weeks to 1 year

F lu-like symptoms

I nsomnia

N ausea

I mbalance

S ensory disturbance

H yperarousal

excerise

a non-drug treatment that has moderate to large effects on depression compared to antidepressants

Seligman’s experiment

an experiment on learned helplessness where dogs were assigned to receive or not receive inescapable shocks; in both conditions dogs were exposed to escapable shocks, but the dogs in the learned helplessness condition did not try to escape the shocks

schizophrenia

a commonly misunderstood psychological disease that ranges in symptomology and severity; by the DSM V is diagnosed as when for a significant portion since the disturbance, one or more major areas of functioning are below their prior levels

positive symptoms

are “extra” symptoms that include delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech, and disorganized behavior

delusions

a type of positive symptom for schizophrenics; are beliefs that don’t change despite evidence

persecution → believe you are being persecuted

reference → believe things are specifically referring to you

influence → believe your choices are being influenced and controlled

grandeur → believe you are larger than life, more important than reality

thought broadcasting → believe your thoughts are being heard outside

thought withdrawal → believe your thoughts are being taken away from outside

negative symptoms

when common things are “taken away”

1) Affective flattening → reduced emotion

2) Alogia → poverty of speech

3) Anhedonia → inability to experience pleasure

4) Apathy → lack of interest

5) Asociality → lack of interest in social relations

6) Avolution → lack of motivation in goal directed behavior

antipsychotics

drugs that are used to treat schizophrenia but have major side effects

tardive dyskenesia

a side effect of antipsychotics that cause involuntary movements in the mouth/tongue/face

cognitive behavioral theory

a type of treatment for schizophrenia and other psychological disorders that involves recognizing harmful thought patterns

diathesis stress model

the idea that schizophrenic symptoms strongly correlate with experiencing stress

Ebbinghaus forgetting curve

a curve that demonstrates how quickly people forget novel information; was replicated with similar curve shapes by other psychologists; Ebbinghaus was able to remember poems 10x faster and had a flatter forgetting curve, consistent with the levels of processing theory

naive realism

the belief that one’s own subjective perception of reality is the true objective observation of events

Kennedy and Pronin 2008

a study on naive realism and biased perception conscious spiral where people A and B disagreed with each other; person A assumed B was biased and unreasonable, resulting in the use of more adversary tactics and less cooperation; person B interprets A’s actions as biased, leading to the spiral

overlearning

a study on this topic, Krueger 1929, used 12 monosyllabic words with 4-5 repeats, showing each word for roughly 2 seconds

memory conformity

in a study on this topic, the two participants viewed a crime from different camera angles, and after discussing, people gave details that were only viewable in their partner’s perspective; could have also resulted from source confusion

source confusion

when an individual misattributes where a memory came from

cataracts

is treatable with surgery where the natural, flexible (accommodating) lens is replaced with a rigid, intraocular lens; this affects monocular focus, including near sight vision; accommodating intraocular lens’s can flex and focus with contractions of ciliary muscles but have not been shown to work well

diabetes

a condition that results in chronically high glucose levels that damages capillaries; this results in damage to the retina and cochlea, which are dense with capillaries

tinnitus

essentially the brain is stuck perceiving a phantom sound signal for a pitch that damaged hair cells can no longer hear

tailor made notch music training

a treatment for tinnitus similar in concept to mirror box therapy where music is designed to cut out the pitch that the individual can not longer hear; like lateral inhibition in vision the auditory system emphasizes certain pitches by diminishing other pitches, causing a decreased perception of the sound that is cut out

heuristic

a cognitive shortcut or “rule of thumb”; a process

bias

the gap between optimal behavior and behavior that results from using a heuristic; the outcome

Kahneman and Redelmeier 1996

a study on pain perception that used colonoscopies; found that retrospective perception of pain could be reduced by pulling the robotic snake almost completely out, leaving the end in for a few minutes, and then pulling the rest out; is due to patients remembering the end of an experience more, causing them to rate the experience as less painful when the change was applied

Fredrickson and Kahneman 1993

a study on pain perception with two conditions:

1) hand submerged in 14C water for 60s

2) hand submerged in 14C water for 60s, then 15C water for 30s

the second condition was rated as more tolerable even though the total time was longer, due the end being in slightly warmer conditions

Lovell, Sutterlin, Sutterlin 2016

a study on peak end bias where people were forced to breath in carbon monoxide, causing a burning feeling in their nose; the retrospective perception was disproportionately influenced by the peak unpleasantness instead of the duration

peak end bias

when the perception of an experience is disproportionately influence by the most intense part of the experience and the end of an experience