Abnormal Psychology: Stress, Trauma, OCD, and Eating Disorders

Vocabulary flashcards covering abnormal psychology concepts, clinical licensing, nervous system divisions, anxiety and stress disorders (PTSD, Acute Stress Disorder, OCD), and eating disorders.

Continuing Education Requirements (NYS Psychologist)

The requirement for New York State licensed psychologists to complete 40 hours of continuing education every six years, including retaking a child abuse course, in order to renew their professional license.

LMHC (Licensed Mental Health Counselor)

A mental health license obtainable with a master's degree that allows clinicians to practice independently without needing external supervision.

Cover Letter

A one-page persuasive document sent to a prospective employer explaining an applicant's skills, education, and experience to show how they can help the organization and secure an interview.

Handshake

An online college job and internship platform, similar to Indeed, that allows students to use their student email to explore off-campus jobs and rotating internships.

All Joy and No Fun

A book examining parenting stress, the accumulation of daily strain leading toward depression, and gender inequities in domestic managerial load within heterosexual relationships.

Reviving Ophelia

A book referencing Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet that explores the societal pressures, relationship stresses, anxiety, and eating disorders experienced by adolescent girls.

The Marshmallow Test

A classic psychological experiment measuring impulse control, delayed gratification, and emotional regulation by testing whether children can wait five minutes without eating a marshmallow to earn a second one.

Sympathetic Nervous System

The branch of the autonomic nervous system that triggers fight-or-flight arousal in response to perceived danger, initiating physiological responses such as adrenaline release.

Parasympathetic Nervous System

The branch of the autonomic nervous system responsible for calming the body down and reducing physiological arousal after a stressor has passed.

Bulimia Nervosa

An eating disorder characterized by consuming excessive calories (bingeing) followed by compensatory purging behaviors such as self-induced vomiting, laxative misuse, or excessive exercise.

Acute Stress Disorder

A trauma-related disorder featuring symptoms identical to PTSD that lasts for a short-term duration between three days and one month following exposure to a traumatic event.

Body Dysmorphic Disorder

An obsessive-compulsive related disorder characterized by a persistent preoccupation and repetitive corrective behaviors centered on perceived flaws in specific physical features (such as the nose), distinct from the weight-centered preoccupation of eating disorders.

PTSD Criterion A

The DSM diagnostic threshold requiring direct exposure, witnessing, or repeated indirect confrontation with actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence.

Four Symptom Clusters of PTSD

The core diagnostic categories for PTSD: re-experiencing (intrusive thoughts/dreams), avoidance (shunning reminders), cognitions (guilt, mistrust, negative beliefs), and arousal (hypervigilance).

Hypervigilance

A state of abnormally heightened sensory sensitivity and arousal where a person feels constantly threatened and is easily startled or rattled by minimal stimuli.

Obsessions

Recurrent, intrusive, and distressing thoughts or ideas that provoke significant anxiety in individuals with OCD.

Compulsions

Repetitive, ritualistic physical or mental behaviors performed specifically to neutralize or reduce the anxiety provoked by obsessive thoughts.

Three Types of OCD Manifestations

The three common behavioral patterns observed in OCD: checking (e.g., locks, stoves), contamination fears (cleaning and handwashing), and symmetry/orderliness (arranging and aligning objects precisely).

Hoarding Disorder

A disorder classified under the OCD spectrum involving persistent obsessive anxieties about discarding items, resulting in the compulsive behavior of collecting and saving objects to find a use for them.

Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI)

A standardized clinical self-report survey used to measure the severity of anxiety symptoms experienced by an individual.

Perceived Stress Scale

A psychological assessment instrument used to evaluate the degree to which situations in a person's life are appraised as unpredictable, uncontrollable, or overloading.