biopsych final (psychopathology)

abnormality

subjective, culturally biased

psychological disorders

can arise medically, psychodynamically, cognitive-behaviorally, humanistically, socioculturally, or biopsychologically

DSM

handbook for operationalizing disorder for studying. Abnormality defined as:

1. maladaptive - handicapping/disrupting everyday life

2. statistically deviant - unusual

3. social norms - defying cultural rules/etiquette

4. personal distress - individual suffers

fear vs anxiety

fear: intense emotion in response to threat

anxiety: unfounded anticipatory fear

phobia

fear out of proportion to threat and persists even if its irrationality is known

SAD

fear or anxiety related to social situations, especially when possible evaluation by others

GAD

frequent intense uncontrollable worry about a variety of everyday situations even when there is little reason for concern

PTSD

specific, characteristic symptoms following direct exposure to one or more traumatic events

Treatments (Benzodiazopenes)

Valum, xanax, atiuan - anxiolytics

• they are GABA agonists, binding as ligand to GABA receptors in the hippocampus and amygdala and open the gates or Cl- to enter

• because Cl is negative, it hyper polarizes the neuron more than GABA alone causing an IPSP

anxiety pathway

a stimulus(trauma) hits the thalamus → the cingulate cortex and hippocampus to get context → amygdala gets over excited triggering the hypothalamus to kick off the HPA axis, stress response, and the hippocampus fails to inhibit the the HPA axis, the PFC, meant to regulate the amygdala goes offline because the sensory trauma is too loud

depression symptoms

pathological low mood, anhedonia(inability to feel pleasure), rumination(repetitive self critical thought), disrupted sleep(early morning wake), psychomotor slowing, feeling of worthlessness, impaired concentration, changes in appetite and energy

systems altered in depression

limbic system, amygdala, hypothalamus, PFC (mood)

reward-dopamine pathways (pleasure)

SCN hypothalamus, melatonin (sleep)

basal ganglia (movement)

depression facial expression bias

when shown neutral, happy, and sad faces people with depression are biased to look at sad faces but unclear where bias came from

• they are also less optimistic or more likely to predict outcome of a situation than controls

psychological process impact on biology (distortions of cognition)

specific local event → generalized takeaway, decreasing reappraisal so cognitive patterns are enforced → catastrophizing, all or nothing thinking → increased activations of stress systems HPA axis

anxiety vs depression arousal

anxiety: anhedonia + hyper excitability

depression: anhedonia + hypo activity

• performance drops from high arousal or very low arousal

cushings disorder

overactive cortisol release, HPA axis overworked

• first symptoms = depressive

• links HPA overworking + cortisol with depression

fortitude and stress

some stress builds resistance but if its continuous then resources for dealing with it are depleted entirely, where major depressive disorder occurs

• as those treated return to a normal state and have some performance while cog state depressive are at higher risk for suicide

cortisol flow through day

• typically decreases through the day and spikes in the morning but in MDD endocrine systems are disrupted so melatonin and oxytocin are too

DMN

• self reflective network active when conscious (PMC, MPFC, AG, cingulate cortex, MTC, MFG, IFG)

• in depression it is disrupted by the amygdala

  • the PFC fails to inhibit the limbic system which is overpowered by the amygdala shutting down the dopamine reward centers = rumination

Depression treatments: SSRIs

increase serotonin by keeping more in the synaptic cleft, blocking re-uptake

• monoamine theory: depression is caused by low levels of of serotonin and epinephrine and DA system

• only for severe depression

psychedelics

• desync DMN activity leading to different cognitive states across regions of brain causing more diverse connectivity (less/more cross talk between regions decreases rumination and increases pos affect)

• mystical experiences can lead to a positive loss of ego(dissociations), visual and auditory changes, hallucinations, dread/panic, loss of control, altered consciousness lvls

other depression treatments

• electroconvulsive therapy: treatment-resistent depression

• cog-behavioral therapy: consider culture, early life stress, SES status