Abpsy Drill 1

Vocabulary flashcards covering key terms and concepts in psychopathology, based on lecture notes.

DSM IV Multiaxial System

A diagnostic system that assesses mental health disorders and conditions, personality disorders, medical conditions, psychosocial and environmental problems, and global assessment of functioning.

Axis I (DSM IV)

Clinical disorders, including mental health disorders and substance use disorders.

Axis II (DSM IV)

Personality disorders and intellectual developmental disorders.

Axis III (DSM IV)

General medical conditions that may affect a patient's mental health.

Axis IV (DSM IV)

Psychosocial and environmental problems.

Axis V (DSM IV)

Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF), rating scale from 0 to 100 summarizing adaptive functioning.

Principal Diagnosis

The condition established after evaluating the individual that is determined to be chiefly responsible for admission (inpatient setting).

Provisional Diagnosis

Used when there is a strong presumption that full criteria will ultimately be met for a disorder, but not enough information is available to make a firm diagnosis.

Psychological Disorder

A psychological dysfunction within an individual associated with distress or impairment in functioning and a response that is not typical or culturally expected.

Psychological Dysfunction

Breakdown in cognitive, emotional, or behavioral functioning.

Distress

Criterion satisfied if the individual is extremely upset; does not by itself define problematic abnormal behavior.

Impairment

Hindrance and obstruction to one's life to an extreme degree.

Atypical or Not Culturally Expected

Something is considered abnormal because it occurs infrequently or violates social norms.

Harmful Dysfunction

Shorthand definition used to determine whether a behavior is out of the individual's control.

Prototypes

Diagnostic criteria from DSM-V where a patient may only have some features/symptoms of the disorder and still meet the criteria.

Psychopathology

The scientific study of psychological disorders.

Clinical Psychologist

Professionals with Ph.D., Ed.P., or Psy.D degrees who conduct research into the causes and treatment of psychological disorders and diagnose, assess, and treat these disorders.

Counseling Psychologist

Professionals who study and treat adjustment and vocational issues encountered by relatively healthy individuals.

Psychiatrists

Professionals with M.D. degrees and specialized residency training who investigate the nature and causes psychological disorders, make diagnoses, and offer treatments, emphasizing drug or biological treatments.

Psychiatric Social Workers

Professionals with a master's degree in social work and expertise in collecting information relevant to the social and family situation of the individual.

Psychiatric Nurses

Professionals with master's degrees or even Ph.D.s who specialize in the care and treatment of patients with psychological disorders, usually in hospitals.

Marriage & Family Therapists and Mental Health Counselors

Professionals with Master's degrees (2 to 3 yrs), who provide clinical services by hospitals, clinics, usually under the supervision of a doctoral-level clinician.

Scientist-Practitioners

Mental health professionals who take a scientific approach to their clinical work.

Clinical Description

The unique combination of behaviors, thoughts, and feelings that make up a specific disorder (specifying what makes the disorder different from normal behavior or from other disorders).

Presenting Problem

A specific problem or set of problems that the patient has, and the reason why they went to the clinic.

Prevalence

How many people in the population as a whole have the disorder.

Incidence

Statistics on how many new cases occur during a given period.

Sex Ratio

Percentage of males & females that have the disorder.

Chronic Course

Tend to last a long time, sometimes a lifetime.

Episodic Course

Likely to recover but there is a recurrence at a later time.

Time-Limited Course

The disorder will improve without treatment in a relatively short period with little or no risk of recurrence.

Acute Onset

They begin suddenly.

Insidious Onset

Develop gradually over an extended period of time.

Prognosis

The anticipated course of disorder.

Developmental Psychology

Study of changes in behavior overtime.

Developmental Psychopathology

Study of changes in abnormal behavior.

Etiology

The study of origins and has to do w/ why a disorder begins (what causes it) and includes biological, psychological, and social dimensions.

Supernatural Model

Agents outside our bodies and environment influence our behavior, thinking, and emotions.

Biological Model

Considers the brain, genetics and chemical imbalances.

Psychological Model

Emphasizes the role of mental processes and learned experiences.

Mass Hysteria

May simply demonstrate the phenomenon of emotion contagion, in which the experience of an emotion seems to spread to those around us.

Humoral Theory

Hippocrates assumed that normal brain functioning was related to bodily fluids or humor.

Hysteria

A somatic symptom disorders, in w/c the physical symptoms appear to be a result of a medical problem for w/c no physico cause can be found (e.g. paralysis and blindness).

General Paresis

A condition in w/c PSY trv patients deteriorated steadily, becoming paralyzed and dying w/in 5 yes of onset.

Moral Therapy

Treating institutionalized patients as normally as possible in a setting that encouraged and reinforced normal social interaction, thus providing them w/ many opportunities for appropriate social and interpersonal contact.

Mesmerism

A state in w/c extremely suggestible subjects sometimes appear to be in a trance.

Catharsis

The process of releasing, and thereby providing relief from, repressed emotions.

Id

Source of strong sexual and aggressive feelings/energies.

Ego

The part of the mind that ensures we act realistically.

Superego

Conscience; represents moral principles instilled in us by our parents and our culture.

Free Association

Patients are instructed to say whatever comes to mind without the usual socially required censoring.

Hierarchy of Needs

Maslow's structure from physiological, to safety, love, and then self esteem needs, then at top comes self actualization.

Systematic Desensitization

Individuals are gradually introduced to the feared objects or situations so that their fear could extinguish.

4 D's of Abnormality

Deviance, distress, dysfunction and danger.

Dependent Variable

Some aspect of the phenomenon that is measured and is expected to be changed or influenced by the independent variable.

Independent Variable

The aspect manipulated or thought to influence the change in the dependent variable.

Clinical Significance

Whether or not the difference was meaningful for those affected.

Patient Uniformity Myth

The tendency to see all participants as one homogenous group, ignoring individual differences.

Allele

One member of a pair (or series) of genes that occupy a specific position on a specific chromosome.

Proband

The family member w/ the trait singled out for study.

Phenotype

The observable characteristics / behavior of the individual.

Genotype

The unique genetic make up of individual people.

Endophenotypes

The genetic mechanisms that ultimately contribute to the underlying problems causing the symptons & difficulties experienced by people w/ psychological disorders.

Genetic Markers

Other inherited characteristics that are assessed at the same time when a family disorder is studied.

Ethnocentric View

Of psychopathology that can limit our understanding of disorders in general a restricting the way we approach treatment.

Anxiety

A negative mood state characterized by bodily symptoms of physical tension and by apprehension about the future.

Fear

An immediate emotional reaction to current danger characterized by strong escapist action tendencies and a surge in the SNS of the Ans flight or fight response.

Panic

An experience of the alarm response of fear when there's nothing to be afraid of fear occurring at an inappropriate time.

Panic Attack

An abrupt experience of intense fear or acute discomfort, accompanied by physical symptoms that usually include heart palpitations, chest pain, shortness of breath, & dizziness.

Expected (Cued) Panic Attack

A PA that you may experience in situations that you are afraid of (ex. high places).

Unexpected (Uncued) PA

Experienced if you don't have a clue when or where the next attack will occur.

Autonomic Restrictors

People w/ GAD in kasi nga they respond less that is, they respond less on most physiological measures (eg. heart rate, BP, skin conductance, respiration rates). They have been called. autonomic restrictors.

Anxious Apprehension

Combination of negative affect, somatic symptoms and cognitions implying what to do in the future if the threat will happen.

Agoraphobia

Fear and avoidance of situations, such as crowds or wide open places, where one has felt loss of control and panic.

Fear of-Fear Hypothesis

Expectations about the catastrophic consequences of experiencing anxiety in public after a PA.

Interoceptive Avoidance

Avoidance of internal physical sensations, is another cluster of avoidance behavior displayed by people w/ panic disorder & agoraphobia.

Nocturnal Panic Attacks

Panic attacks occur more often between 1:30 AM & 3:30 AM than any other time.

Specific Phobia

Is an irrational fear of a specific object or situation that markedly interferes with an individual's ability to function.

Separation Anxiety Disorder

Characterized by children's unrealistic & persistent worry that something will happen to their parents or other important people in their life or something will happen to themselves that'll separate them from their parents.

Selective Mutism (SM)

A rare childhood disorder characterized by a lack of speech in one or more settings in w/o speaking is socially expected.

PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder)

A disorder characterized by haunting memories, nightmares, social withdrawal, jumpy anxiety, numbness of feeling, and/or insomnia that lingers for four weeks or more after a traumatic experience

Acute Stress Disorder

Begin within 4 weeks of the treuneric event and last for 3 days to I north.

Adjustment Disorders

Describe anxious or depressive reactions to life stress that are generally milder than one would see in ASD or PTSD.

Reactive Attachment Disorder

Disturbed & developmentally inappropriate behaviors in children, emerging before a child is 54.0, unable or unwilling to form normal attachment relationships w/ are giving adults.

Obsessions

Intrusive and mostly nonsensical thoughts, images, or urges that the individual tries to resist or eliminate.

Compulsions

The thoughts or actions used to suppress the obsessions & provide relief.

Thought-Action Fusion

People w/ old equate thoughts w/ the specific actions or activity represented by the thoughts (ex: thinking about abortion is the moral equivalent of having an abortion).

Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD)

A preoccupation w/ some imaged defect in appearance by someone who actually looks reasonably normal.

Ideas of Reference

They think everything that goes on in the world 43 related to them in Some how or in this case, to their imaged defect

Trichotillomania / Hair Pulling Disorder

The urge to pull out one's own hair from anywhere on the body, including the scalp, eyebrows, and arms results in noticeable hair loss, distress and significant social impairments.

Somatic Symptom Disorder

Have no specific cause but experience significant distress and physical problems as a result.

Illness Anxiety Disorder

People interpret normal physical sensations as symptoms of a disease or illness.

Generalized Amnesia

People are unable to remember anything including who they are (be lifelong or may extend from a period in the more recent past, such as 6 mes or a year previously).

Cataplexy

A sudden loss of voluntary muscle tone.

Localized / Selective Amnesia

Far more common failure to recall specific events, usually traumatic, that people w/ this did not have amnesia for the events themselves but rather for their intense emotional reactions to the event.

Malingering

Their motivation to get out of some thing, such as work or legal difficulties, or they attempt to gain Something, such as a financial settlement [external goals].

Factitious Disorders

Symptoms are under voluntary control but there is no obvious reason for voluntarily producing the symptom except, possibly to assume the sick role and receive attention [internal goals].- may extend to other family members

La belle indifference

Paradoxical absence of psychological distress despite having a serious medical illness or symptoon related to a health condition. [Also note that this isn't necessarily a symptom]

Delirium

Characterized by impaired consciousness and cognition during the core of hours or daysseveral they appear confused, disoriented, and out of touch of their surroundings.

Agraphia

Impairment in the ability to write.