Unit 8: Mental Health and Clinical Psychology

Psychological Disorder

a syndrome marked by a clinically significant disturbance in an individual's cognition, emotion regulation, or behavior. These conditions are marked by four criteria: They are maladaptive, disturbing to others, unusual and irrational.

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)

Reference book that describes the symptoms of everything currently considered to be a psychological disorder.

Anxiety Disorders

Category of Psychological disorders that include phobias, generalized anxiety disorder and panic disorder.

Specific Phobia

Intense, unwarranted fear of a situation or object.

Agoraphobia

An abnormal fear of open or public places

Social Anxiety Disorder

Fear of a situation in which one could embarrass oneself in public, especially public speaking.

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Condition where a person experiences constant, low level anxiety or nervousness.

Panic Disorder

Condition where a person suffers from acute episodes of intense anxiety with no obvious cause or trigger.

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

an anxiety disorder characterized by unwanted repetitive thoughts (obsessions) and/or actions (compulsions)

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

an anxiety disorder characterized by haunting memories, nightmares, social withdrawal, jumpy anxiety, and/or insomnia that lingers for a prolonged amount of time after a traumatic experience

Somatic Symptom Disorders

Psychological difficulties that take on a physical (somatic) form, but for which there is no medical cause

Conversion Disorder

A rare somatoform disorder in which a person experiences very specific genuine physical symptoms for which no physiological basis can be found. (Hysterical Blindness)

Dissociative Disorders

disorders in which conscious awareness becomes separated (dissociated) from previous memories, thoughts, and feelings

Psychogenic Amnesia

loss of memory in the absence of any brain injury or disease and thought to have psychological causes

Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID)

a rare dissociative disorder in which a person exhibits two or more distinct and alternating personalities. Formerly called "multiple personality disorder."

Depressive Disorders

Mood disorders in which the individual suffers from depression—an unrelenting lack of pleasure in life.

Major Depressive Disorder

A mood disorder in which a person experiences, in the absence of drugs or a medical condition, two or more weeks of significantly depressed moods, feelings of worthlessness, and diminished interest or pleasure in most activities.

Seasonal Affective Disorder

depression that involves recurrent depressive episodes in a seasonal pattern, usually winter when there is less sunlight.

Bipolar Disorder

A mood disorder in which the person alternates between the hopelessness and lethargy of depression and the overexcited state of mania.

Learned Helplessness

A condition that occurs after a period of negative consequences where the person begins to believe they have no control over their actions in life and therefore become depressed.

Schizophrenic Disorders

A class of psychological disorders marked by disturbances in thought that spill over to affect perceptual, social, and emotional processes. This takes the form of audio/visual hallucinations and delusional thinking.

Catatonia

a state of unresponsiveness to one's outside environment, usually including muscle rigidity, staring, and inability to communicate.

Dopamine Hypothesis

the idea that schizophrenia involves an excess of dopamine activity

Tardive Dyskinesia

A neurological disorder marked by chronic tremors and involuntary spastic movements caused by the overuse of antipsychotic drugs.

Diathesis-Stress Model

suggests that a person may be predisposed for a psychological disorder genetically but that it remains unexpressed until triggered by environmental stress.

Personality Disorders

psychological disorders characterized by inflexible and enduring behavior patterns that impair social functioning

Antisocial Personality Disorder

A personality disorder in which the person (usually a man) exhibits a lack of conscience for wrongdoing, even toward friends and family members. May be aggressive and ruthless or a clever con artist. This condition can be expressed as sociopathy (low emotional connections with an aggressive personality) or psychopathy (no emotional connections with distant, cold personality.)

Dependent Personality Disorder

A personality disorder characterized by a pattern of clinging and obedience, fear of separation, and an ongoing need to be taken care of.

Paranoid Personality Disorder

type of personality disorder characterized by extreme suspiciousness or mistrust of others

Narcissistic Personality Disorder

characterized by a grandiose sense of self-importance, a preoccupation with fantasies of success or power, and a need for constant attention or admiration

Histrionic Personality Disorder

a personality disorder characterized by excessive emotionality and preoccupation with being the center of attention; emotional shallowness; overly dramatic behavior

Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder

a personality disorder characterized by preoccupation with orderliness, perfection, and control

Rosenhan Study

1978 study in which healthy individuals were admitted into mental hospitals after saying they were hearing voices. Once in, they acted normally and still were not labeled as impostors. Served as proof that misdiagnosis of mental disorders was prevalent in certain institutions.

Psychotherapy

treatment involving psychological techniques; consists of interactions between a trained therapist and someone seeking to overcome psychological difficulties or achieve personal growth through talk therapy

Psychoanalysis

Freud's theory of personality that attributes thoughts and actions to unconscious motives and conflicts; the techniques used in treating psychological disorders by seeking to expose and interpret unconscious tensions

Free Association

in psychoanalysis, a method of exploring the unconscious in which the person relaxes and says whatever comes to mind, no matter how trivial or embarrassing

Dream Analysis

A psychoanalytic technique in which the therapist interprets the symbolic meaning of the client's dreams. The therapist is looking for latent or hidden content that leads to the root of the patient's problem

Manifest Content

according to Freud, the remembered story line of a dream

Latent Content

according to Freud, the underlying meaning of a dream

Resistance

in psychoanalysis, the blocking from consciousness of anxiety-laden material

Transference

in psychoanalysis, the patient's transfer to the analyst of emotions linked with other relationships (such as love or hatred for a parent)

Somatic Treatments

the use of drugs to treat mental illness

Psychodynamic Theorists (Neo-Freudians)

- Psychologists who have been influenced by Freud's work but have significantly modified his original theory.

Humanistic Therapies

therapies that emphasize the development of human potential and the belief that human nature is basically positive

Carl Rogers

1902-1987; humanistic contributions: founded person-centered therapy, theory that emphasizes the unique quality of humans especially their freedom and potential for personal growth, unconditional positive regard, fully functioning person

Client-Centered Therapy (Person Centered)

a humanistic therapy, developed by Carl Rogers; therapist uses non-directive techniques such as active listening with a genuine, accepting, empathic environment to facilitate clients' growth; uses bits and pieces of neo-Freudian views; calls for unconditional positive regard; goal is to help client become a fully-functioning person

Unconditional Positive Regard

a caring, accepting, nonjudgmental attitude, which Carl Rogers believed would help clients to develop self-awareness and self-acceptance

Active Listening

Empathic listening in which the listener echoes, restates, and clarifies. A feature of Rogers' client-centered therapy.

Gestalt Therapy

form of directive insight therapy in which the therapist helps clients to accept all parts of their feelings and subjective experiences, using leading questions and planned experiences such as role-playing

Eclectic Approach

an approach to psychotherapy that uses techniques from various forms of therapy

Counterconditioning

a behavior therapy procedure that uses classical conditioning to evoke new responses to stimuli that are triggering unwanted behaviors; includes exposure therapies and aversive conditioning

Systematic Desensitization

A type of exposure therapy that associates a pleasant relaxed state with gradually increasing anxiety-triggering stimuli. Commonly used to treat phobias.

Flooding

a treatment for phobias in which clients are exposed repeatedly and intensively to a feared object and made to see that it is actually harmless

Aversive Conditioning

a type of counterconditioning that associates an unpleasant state (such as nausea) with an unwanted behavior (such as drinking alcohol)

Token Economy

an operant conditioning procedure in which people earn a token of some sort for exhibiting a desired behavior and can later exchange the tokens for various privileges or treats

Cognitive Therapies

therapy that teaches people new, more adaptive ways of thinking and acting; based on the assumption that thoughts intervene between events and our emotional reactions

Cognitive Therapy for Depression

- Developed by Aaron Beck

- Involves trying to get clients to engage in pursuits that will bring them success. This will alleviate the depression while also identifying and challenging the irrational ideas that cause unhappiness.

- Beck explains depression using the cognitive triad: people's beliefs about themselves, their world, and their futures.

- People suffering from depression often have irrationally negative beliefs about all three of these areas. Cognitive therapy aims to make these beliefs more positive.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

a popular integrative therapy that combines cognitive therapy (changing self-defeating thinking) with behavior therapy (changing behavior)

Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT)

a confrontational cognitive therapy, developed by Albert Ellis, that vigorously challenges people's illogical, self-defeating attitudes and assumptions

Group Therapy

therapy conducted with groups rather than individuals, permitting therapeutic benefits from group interaction

Somatic Therapies

Therapies that produce bodily changes. Used by psychologists with a biological orientation.

Psychopharmacology

the study of the effects of drugs on mind and behavior, drugs used to treat psychological disorders like Zoloft

Antipsychotic Drugs

drugs like Thorazine or Haldol used to treat schizophrenia and other forms of severe thought disorder

Antidepressant Drugs

drugs used to treat depression, anxiety disorders, OCD, and PTSD like Prozac

Antianxiety Drugs

A category of drugs that includes the barbiturates and benzodiazepines, drugs that diminish feelings of anxiety.

Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT)

a biomedical therapy for severely depressed patients in which a brief electric current is sent through the brain of an anesthetized patient

Psychosurgery

surgery that removes or destroys brain tissue in an effort to change behavior, early lobotomy surgeries were considered unethical as they did more damage to the brain

Clinical Psychologists

Psychologists who specialize in the diagnosis and treatment of psychological disorders and everyday behavioral problems. Hold doctorate degrees

Counseling Psychologists

Therapists with graduate degrees in psychology and usually deal with less severe problems than clinical psychologists do

Psychoanalysts

practitioners of psychoanalysis who are schooled in the Freudian tradition, they may or may not hold medical degrees