Psychopathology and Clinical Psychology Concepts

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering psychopathology, assessment methods, behavioral therapies, research designs, and ethical principles.

point prevalence

The percentage of people in a given population who have a given disorder at any particular point in time.

Lifetime Prevalence

The percentage of people in the population who have had a disorder at some point in their lives.

Commorbidity

Co-occurrence of two or more diagnoses within the same person.

parsimony

Simpler explanation preferred.

idiographic assessment

Data collection that evaluates a individual's unique abilities, experiences, and behaviors most commonly through case studies (qualitative).

Nomothetic assessment

Focuses on broad, generalized principles across large groups through surveys (quantitative).

moderator variable

A variable that shows the strength and direction between two other variables.

Mental Disorder (DSM-5 Definition)

Must have these three traits: internal pattern, underlying dysfunction, and a period of distress or disability.

Equifinality

Developmental psychopathology principle that a behavior or disorder may have several causes.

Multifinality

The concept that various outcomes may stem from similar beginnings.

Family Studies

Researchers assess hereditary influence by examining blood relatives to see how much they resemble one another on a specific trait.

Adoption Studies

Research studies that assess hereditary influence by examining the resemblance between adopted children and both their biological and their adoptive parents.

Shared environment

Those environmental factors that are experienced by all relevant members of a household.

non-shared environment

Unique aspects of a person's environment and experience that are not shared with family members.

Gene-environment correlations: passive

Occur because parents provide both genes and environment to their children.

diathesis-stress model

A diagnostic model that proposes that a disorder may develop when an underlying vulnerability is coupled with a precipitating event.

Gene-enviroment correlation: evocative

An individual's heritable traits, temperament, or behavior evoke specific reactions from the people and environment around them.

gene-environment correlations: active

Occur when an individual seeks out or creates environments based on genetic predispositions.

Falsifiability

If we claim something is scientifically true, we must be able to specify what evidence it would take to prove it wrong.

multi-method assessment

An approach to personality assessment that emphasizes the use of multiple methods rather than only one method.

multi-informant assessment

The process of gathering data from several different people (e.g., parents, teachers, child) to obtain an estimate of children's functioning across settings.

Antecedent (A)

The trigger or what happens immediately before the behavior.

Behavior (B)

The action/observable response or action the person takes (ex: yelling, withdrawing).

Consequence (C)

What happens immediately after the behavior and can determine if the behavior will repeat.

convergent validity

Degree to which two tests measure same construct or measure different constructs. In other words is there a pattern?

construct validity

The degree to which a test measures what it claims, or purports, to be measuring.

Behavioral Therapy

Uses conditioning to shape a client's behaviors in the desired direction. Commonly used to desensitize anxiety patients to phobias or anxiety-provoking stimuli.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

Therapy focusing on changing negative thought patterns. Uses tools to recognize connections between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.

interpersonal therapy

Treatment that strengthens social skills and targets interpersonal problems, conflicts, and life transitions. Focuses on the quality of relationships.

Family Systems Therapy

Psychotherapy that focuses on the family, rather than the individual, as the source of problems; family therapists challenge communication styles, disrupt pathological family dynamics, and challenge defensive conceptions in order to harmonize relationships among all members.

Efficacy

Measures how well a treatment or intervention is working under ideal, controlled conditions.

Intersectionality

An analytic framework for assessing how factors such as race, gender, and class interact to shape individual life chances and societal patterns of stratification.

Adaptive behavior

Those skills or abilities that enable the individual to meet standards of personal independence and responsibility that would be expected of his or her age and social group.

Maladaptive Behavior

Interference to adaptive behavior over time. actions or patterns that interfere with an individual's ability to achieve core developmental milestones, adjust to environmental demands, or function effectively across the lifespan.

Social cognition

Underlying frameworks for how to function socially.

Temperament

Actions/emotions in response to environmental stimuli.

Proximal risk

Risk factors experienced directly by the child.

Distal risk

Broader, structural threats/factors; a background, indirect, or "upstream" condition that contributes to an outcome through a chain of intermediate steps rather than causing it directly.

Beneficence

Doing good or causing good to be done; kindly action.

Nonmaleficence

Avoidance of harm or hurt.

Dodo verdict

A term used to describe the fining that all no single system of psychotherapy works best under all circumstances for adults.

Effectiveness

Measures how well treatment works in everyday, real-world settings.