Psychology U4 AOS2 Mental Wellbeing

Mental Wellbeing

An individual’s psychological state, including their ability to think, process information, and regulate emotions.

Level of Functioning

The degree to which an individual can complete day-to-day tasks in an independent and effective manner.

Resilience

The ability to cope with and manage change and uncertainty to restore positive functioning.

Social Wellbeing

The ability to have and maintain satisfying relationships and interactions with others to adapt to different social situations.

Emotional Wellbeing

The ability to control emotions and express them appropriately, as well as understand the emotions of ohters.

SEWB Framework

a multidimensional, holistic approach to wellbeing that considers the whole person, including their mental, physical, spiritual and social needs.

May See Frogs By Crossing Country Creek (SEWB)

Mind and Emotions, Spirituality, Family and Kinship, Body, Culture, Community, Country

Mental Wellbeing Continuum

a tool used to measure mental wellbeing, as it fluctuates and is not static

Internal Factor

Factors that arise from within the individual. Often biological and psychological factors

External Factor

factors that arise from the individual’s environment. Often social factors

Stress

A physiological and psychological state that occurs when an individual encounters a stressor.

Anxiety

a psychological and physiological response that involves feelings of worry and apprehension about a perceived threat.

Phobia

a type of diagnosable anxiety disorder that is categorised by excessive and disproportionate fear when encountering or anticipating encountering a particular stimulus.

GABA Dysfunction and Phobia

contributing factor, insufficient neural transmission or reception of GABA (inhibitory neurotransmitter) in the body, which leads to exaggerated fear responses

Long Term Potentiation and Phobia

perpetuating factor, association between a phobic stimulus and a fear or anxiety response is neurologically strengthened through LTP

Classical Conditioning

a precipitating factor, which increases the susceptibility to and contributes to the occurrence of developing a specific phobia.

Operant Conditioning

perpetuating factor, and inhibits a person’s ability to recover from a specific phobia, encouraging avoidant behaviour

Memory Bias

a cognitive bias caused by inaccurate or exaggerated memories of phobic stimuli.

Catastrophic Thinking

a cognitive bias in which a stimulus is predicted to be worse than it is.

Specific Environmental Trigger

Stimuli or experiences in a person’s environment that evoke an extreme stress response, leading to the development of the phobia.

SET - Direct Confrontation

a personal experience with the phobic stimulus.

SET - Observation

witnessing another’s experience with the phobic stimulus.

SET - Learning/Indirect

being informed about the phobic stimulus.

Stigma

the feeling of shame or disgrace by an individual for a characteristic that differentiates them from others.

Agonist

a type of drug that imitates neurotransmitter and works to initiate a neural response (exitatory or inhibitory) when it binds to the receptor site of a neuron.

Benzodiazepine

a type of medication that increases the effectiveness of GABA, which is then able to have an inhibitory effect, reducing anxiety.

Breathing Retraining

A method used to teach breathing control techniques, which reduces physiological arousal by activating the parasympathetic nervous system.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)

A form of psychotherapy that encourages individuals to subsitute dysfunctional cognitions and behaviours with more adaptive ones.

Systematic Desensitisation

A therapeutic technique that is used to overcome phobias that involve a patient being exposed incrementally to increasingly anxiety-inducing stimuli, combined with the use of relaxation techniques.

Psychoeducation

The provision and explanation of information about mental disorder to supporting individuals to increase knowledge and understanding of the disorder and its treatment.

Protective Factors

strategies that enable an individual promote and maintain high levels of mental wellbeing

Determinants

Factors that influence wellbeing on individual and community levels, used for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.

Cultural Continuity

The passing down and active practice of cultural knowledge, traditions and values from generations to generation.

Self Determination

The rights of all people to pursue freely their economic, social and cultural development without outside interference.