Clinical Psychology

Schizophrenia

Characterised by disturbances across many aspects of a person’s thoughts, feelings, experience and behaviour.

Flattened affect

The absence or reduction of an outward expression of feelings or emotions, such as facial expression.

Positive symptoms

An experience that is ‘in addition to’ or a ‘distortion of’ normal experience

Negative symptoms

When level of functioning or experience falls below normal levels

Persecutory delusion

A strongly held belief that you are in danger, that you are being conspired against and that others are pursuing you to try to do you harm

Grandiose delusion

A strongly held belief that you are someone with special abilities or special powers

Delusion of reference

A strongly held belief that events in the environment are related to you

Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI)

a 53-item self-report measure designed to assess nine symptom dimensions (such as anxiety and depression) over the last seven days

Interpersonal sensitivity

A tendency to focus on feelings of personal inadequacy or inferiority, and a feeling of marked discomfort during interpersonal interactions

Family study

A type of study investigating whether biological relatives of those with a disorder a more likely than non-biological relatives to be similarly affected

Twin study

A type of study that compares sets of twins to analyse similarities and differences

Adoption study

A type of study looking at the similarities between adopted individuals and their biological parents

Concordance

The presence of a particular observable trait or disorder in both individuals between family members and within a set of twins

Positron emission tomography (PET)

A technique that uses gamma cameras to detect radioactive tracers. The tracers accumulates in areas of high activity during the scan, allowing them to become visible for analysis.

Acute episodes

A period of time during which a person is suffering with psychotic symptoms.

Cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT)

A treatment that incorporates aspects of cognitive and behavioural approaches to treating psychological disorders

Typical antipsychotics

Antipsychotics developed in the 1950s that redice the effect of dopamine in order to reduce positive symptoms of schizophrenia

Atypical antipsychotics

Antipsychotics developed in the 1990s that affect dopamine levels in order to reduce both positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia

Episodic mood disorder

A condition characterised by episodes of time where mood is either very low or high

Manic episodes

A period of at least a week where mood is extremely high

Depressive episode

A period of at least two weeks which involves depressed mood or lack of interest in usual activities for most of the day, nearly every day

Hypomanic episode

A less extreme version of a manic episode, which involves serveral day of persistent elevated mood or increased irritability

Mixed episode

A period of two weeks where there is a mixture of manic and depressive states

Sexually dimorphic

Any differences between males and females of any species that are not just differences in organs

Attribution

The cognitive process by which individuals explain the cause of behaviour and events 

Meta-analysis

Data from a range of studies into the same subject are combined and analysed to get an overall understand of the trends

Kleptomania

A disorder characterised by a powerful impulse to steal; the impulse is very hard to resist and individuals will steal as a result

Pyromania

A disorder characterised by a powerful impulse to setfires; the impulse is very hard to resist and individuals will persistently set fires

Gambling disorder

A disorder involving a pattern of persistent or recurring gambling behaviour either offline or online

Kleptomania Symptom Assessment Scale (K-SAS)

an 11-item self-rated scale that measures impulses, thoughts, feelings, and behaviours related to stealing. Each item is rated on a scale from 0 to 4.

Positive reinforcement

When a behaviour results in a reward, such as money or attention, that behaviour is likely to be repeated again

Opiate anatagonists

A group of drugs that have traditionally been used to treat substance abuse; they work by blocking the reward centres in the brain that are activated by drug or alcohol use

Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale Modified for Pathological Gambling (PG-YBOCS)

a clinician-administered scale to assess gambling severity by assessing symptoms over the previous seven days, in terms of both gambling urges and behaviours.

Muscle relaxation

Used in therapies to relieve tension from within the body and mind; can be induced using medication, visualisation exercises or reptition of calming phrases

Blood Injection Phobia Inventory (BIPI)

a self-report measure that lists 18 possible situations involving blood and injections. Each situation is set on a four point scale from 0 to 3.

The Generalised Anxiety Disorder 7 (GAD-7)

a screening test that has seven items to measure the severity of anxiety. Each item is rated from 0 to 3, and these scores refer to the frequency of occurrence of symptoms.

Negative reinforcement

An increased likelihood of repeating the behaviour, due to the removal of something negative or unpleasant

Counterconditioning

Replacing a conditioned response, such as fear, with another response, such as a feeling of calm

In vitro and in vivo

In vitro: instances where exposure to the phobic stimulus is imagined

In vivo: instances where exposure to the phobic stimulus in real life 

Maudsley Obsessive-Compulsive Inventory (MOCI)

a short assessment tool that contains 30 items that are scored either ‘true’ or ‘false’ with symptoms relating to checking (9), washing (11), slowness (7) and doubting (7). Scores ranging from 0 to 30.

Habituated

When a person becomes accustomed to something; when someone is frequently exposed to a certain stimulus then over time, they become used to it

Beck Depression Inventory (BDI)

a 21-item self-report measure used to measure attitudes and symptoms of depression, with each item consisting of four statements. Each of the four options for each item has a score ranging from 0 to 3.

Attributional Style Questionnaire (ASQ)

a measure consist of 12 items which are hypothetical good or bad events. Participants write out a cause for each event, and rate the events in terms of internality, stability, and globality on a 7 point scale.

Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS)

a tool that involves a semi-structured interview and a ten-item severity scale that rate the time patients spend on obsessions, how hard they are to resist and how much distress they cause. Each item is rated from 0 to 4, and scores can range from 0 to 40.

Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP)

A form of CBT - individuals are exposed to stimuli that provoke their obsessions and the associated distress, while at the same time they are helped to prevent their compulsive behaviours.

Covert sensitisation

Classical conditioning - an unpleasant stimulus such as nausea or an anxiety-producing image such as vommitting is paired with an undesirable behaviour in order to change that behaviour.

Imaginal desensitization

Patients imagine scenarios where they experience impulses, and then they practice different coping responses (like deep breathing or mental distraction) until the impulse subsides.

Beck’s cognitive restructuring

A form of talking therapy between a patient and a therapist where the therapist aims at questioning and identifying illogical thinking to determine and change the patient’s way of thinking.

Selective Serotonin Reputake Inhibitors (SSRIs)

A drug that acts on the neurotransmitter serotonin and stop it from being reabsorbed and broken down once it has crossed a synapse in the brain.

Monoamine Oxidase Inhibitors (MAOIs)

A form of antidepressant drug that inhibit the work of the monoamine oxidase enzyme from breaking down neurotransmitters such as dopamine and serotonin.

Tricyclics

Drugs that were introduced in the 1950s and usually used when other treatments have failed - they increase levels of serotonin and norepinephrine in the brain by stopping them from being reabsorbed.