Mental Illness Key Terms and People

Flashcards based on lecture notes about the history, definitions, and treatment of mental illness.

What is Agoraphobia?

An anxiety disorder distinguished by feelings that a place is uncomfortable or unsafe due to it being open or crowded.

What is Animism?

The belief that everyone and everything had a soul, and mental illness was due to evil spirits.

What is Antisocial behavior?

A pattern of disregard and violation of the rights of others, possibly involving aggression, deceit, or breaking laws.

What is Anxiety?

A mood state with negative affect, muscle tension, and arousal, anticipating future danger.

What is an Asylum?

A place of refuge for the mentally ill; a forerunner to mental hospitals.

What is Avoidant behavior?

A pattern of social inhibition, feelings of inadequacy, and sensitivity to negative evaluation.

What is Biological Vulnerability?

A genetic/neurobiological factor that predisposes one to anxiety disorders.

What is the Biopsychosocial Model?

A model where biological, psychological, and sociocultural factors influence individual development.

What is Borderline Personality Disorder?

A pattern of instability in relationships, self-image, and impulsivity.

What is the Cathartic Method?

A therapeutic procedure where a patient gains insight and relief from reliving traumatic events.

What is Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT)?

Approaches aimed at changing thoughts and behaviors that influence psychopathology.

What is Cognitive Bias Modification?

Using exercises (e.g., computer games) to change problematic thinking habits.

What is Comorbidity?

Having more than one psychological or physical disorder at a given time.

What is a Conditioned Response?

A learned reaction following classical conditioning.

What is Cultural Relativism?

The idea that cultural norms and values should be understood in their own context.

What is Dependent Personality Disorder?

An excessive need to be taken care of, leading to submissive behavior and fear of separation.

What is Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)?

A treatment for borderline personality disorder that incorporates CBT and mindfulness.

What is the Dialectical Worldview?

A perspective in DBT emphasizing the joint importance of change and acceptance.

What is Etiology?

The causal description of factors contributing to the development of a disorder.

What is Exposure Therapy?

Engaging with a problematic situation without avoidance.

What are External Cues?

Stimuli in the outside world that trigger anxiety or remind of past trauma.

What is the Fight or Flight Response?

A biological reaction to stressors that prepares the body to resist or escape a threat.

What is the Five-Factor Model?

Broad dimensions used to describe human personality.

What is a Flashback?

Sudden, intense re-experiencing of a previous event, usually trauma-related.

What is Free Association?

Reporting all thoughts without censorship in psychodynamic therapy.

What is Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD)?

Excessive worry about everyday things that is out of proportion to the specific causes of worry.

What is Histrionic Personality Disorder?

A pattern of excessive emotionality and attention-seeking.

What is Humorism (or humoralism)?

The belief that an excess or deficiency in any of the four bodily fluids directly affected health and temperament.

What is Hysteria?

Term used by the ancient Greeks and Egyptians to describe a disorder believed to be caused by a woman's uterus wandering throughout the body interfering with other organs.

What is Integrative or Eclectic Psychotherapy?

Approaches combining multiple orientations (e.g., CBT with psychoanalytic elements).

What are Internal Bodily or Somatic Cues?

Physical sensations that trigger anxiety or remind of past traumatic events.

What is Interoceptive Avoidance?

Avoidance of situations that produce sensations of physical arousal similar to those during a panic attack.

What is Maladaptive behavior?

Behaviors that cause physical/emotional harm, prevent daily functioning, and/or indicate a loss of touch with reality.

What is Mesmerism?

An early version of hypnotism in which hysterical symptoms could be treated through animal magnetism.

What is Mindfulness?

A process that reflects a nonjudgmental, yet attentive, mental state.

What is Mindfulness-Based Therapy?

A psychotherapy grounded in mindfulness theory and practice.

What is Narcissistic Personality Disorder?

A pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and lack of empathy.

What is Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder?

A pattern of preoccupation with orderliness, perfectionism, and control.

What is Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)?

Characterized by the desire to engage in certain behaviors excessively or compulsively in hopes of reducing anxiety.

What is Panic Disorder (PD)?

Marked by regular strong panic attacks, and worry about future attacks.

What is Paranoid Personality Disorder?

A distrust and suspiciousness of others such that their motives are interpreted as malevolent.

What is Personality?

Characteristic, routine ways of thinking, feeling, and relating to others.

What are Personality Disorders?

When personality traits result in significant distress, social impairment, and/or occupational impairment.

What is Person-Centered Therapy?

A therapeutic approach focused on creating a supportive environment for self-discovery.

What is Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)?

A sense of intense fear, triggered by memories of a past traumatic event, that another traumatic event might occur.

What is Psychoanalytic Therapy?

Sigmund Freud's therapeutic approach focusing on resolving unconscious conflicts.

What is Psychogenesis?

Developing from psychological origins.

What are Psychological Vulnerabilities?

Influences that our early experiences have on how we view the world.

What is a Reinforced Response?

The strengthening of a response following either the delivery of a desired consequence or escape from an aversive consequence.

What is SAD Performance Only?

Social anxiety disorder which is limited to certain situations that the sufferer perceives as requiring some type of performance.

What is Schizoid Personality Disorder?

A detachment from social relationships and a restricted range of emotional expression.

What is Schizotypal Personality Disorder?

Featuring discomfort with close relationships, perceptual distortions, and eccentric behavior.

What is Social anxiety disorder (SAD)?

Marked by acute fear of social situations which lead to worry and diminished day to day functioning.

What is Somatogenesis?

Developing from physical/bodily origins.

What are Specific Vulnerabilities?

How our experiences lead us to focus and channel our anxiety.

What is Supernatural?

Developing from origins beyond the visible, observable universe.

What is a Syndrome?

A group of symptoms that occur together and characterize a particular abnormality or condition.

What is Thought-Action Fusion?

Overestimating the relationship between a thought and an action.

What is Traitement moral?

A therapeutic regimen of improved nutrition, living conditions, and rewards for productive behavior.

What is Trephination?

The drilling of a hole in the skull, presumably as a way of treating psychological disorders.

Who was HIPPOCRATES?

A Greek physician who attempted to separate superstition and religion from medicine and systematized the belief that a deficiency or excess of the humors was responsible for physical and mental illness.

Who was GALEN?

A Greek physician who wrote several volumes that summarized all the medical knowledge of his day

Who were JOHANN WEYER & REGINALD SCOT?

They tried to convince people in the mid- to late-16th century that accused witches were actually women with mental illnesses.

Who were PHILIPPE PINEL & JEAN-BAPTISTE PUSSIN?

Proponents of moral therapy; believed that patients should not be restrained.

Who was WILIAM TUKE?

Established the York Retreat in 1796, where patients were guests, not prisoners, and where the standard of care depended on dignity and courtesy as well as the therapeutic and moral value of physical work.

Who was DOROTHEA DIX?

A reformer and pioneer in the movement to treat the insane as mentally ill, beginning in the 1820's, she was responsible for improving conditions in jails, poorhouses and insane asylums throughout the U.S. and Canada.

Who was FRANZ ANTON MESMER?

German physician whose theories and practices led to modern-day hypnotism. His unorthodox methods of treating illness were highly popular with his patients, and emphasized mind- over matter treatment of illness.

Who was EMIL KRAEPELIN?

A pioneer of diagnostic categorization in mental health who was one of the first to assign formal labels to particular clusters of symptoms.

Who was SIGMUND FREUD?

Austrian neurologist known for his work on the unconscious mind. Father of psychoanalysis.