Psychopathology

Test Study Material

Anxiety

A mental health condition characterized by excessive worry, fear, or nervousness that can interfere with daily activities. It may manifest in various forms, including generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and social anxiety disorder.

Anxiety Disorders

involve anxiety that is not warranted by the current context, meaning the discomfort is too severe or too frequent, lasts too long, or is activated too easily

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

is characterized by disproportionate, uncontrollable, ongoing anxiety and worry about multiple events, persisting most days for six months or more. Symptoms include difficulty controlling worry, and three or more physical symptoms such as being restless or edgy, irritability, fatigue, poor concentration, muscle tension, or sleep problems. It is sometimes described as free-floating anxiety.

Panic Disorder

involves recurrent, unexpected panic attacks, followed by at least one month of continual concern about having additional attacks or dysfunctional behavior change related to the attacks.

Panic Attacks

are periodic, short bouts of panic that occur suddenly, reach a peak within minutes, and gradually pass.

Specific Phobia

is a marked, persistent, and disproportionate fear of a specific object or situation, typically lasting at least six months. Exposure to the feared object or situation provokes intense anxiety

Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD)

is pronounced, disproportionate, and repeated anxiety about being scrutinized in social situations. The focus is on being negatively evaluated, and the situation is avoided

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

is diagnosed when a person has recurrent, unwanted, intrusive thoughts, urges, or images (obsessions) and/or repetitive behaviors or mental acts (compulsions) that they feel they must perform to prevent something or reduce distress. The obsessions or compulsions must be excessive or unreasonable, cause great distress, take up much time, and interfere with daily functions.

Obsessions

are recurrent thoughts, urges, or images that are intrusive and unwanted, which the person attempts to stop

Compulsions

are repetitive and rigid behaviors or mental acts done to prevent something or reduce distress.

Classical conditioning

is when two events that occur close together in time become strongly associated in a person’s mind, leading the person to react similarly to both

Operant conditioning

involves the components of avoidance and negative reinforcement. Avoidance behaviors are performed to prevent feared events or reduce distress

Exposure treatment

is a cognitive-behavioral approach where people are exposed to the objects or situations they dread

Systematic desensitization

is an exposure technique where clients learn to relax while gradually facing the feared objects or situations

Flooding

is an exposure treatment where clients are forced to face their feared objects or situations repeatedly without relaxation training or gradual buildup, to help them see that the objects are harmless

In vivo

refers to an actual confrontation (exposure) with the feared item

Covert

refers to an imagined confrontation (exposure) with the feared event

Modeled/Modeling

involves the therapist confronting the feared object or situation while the fearful person observes

Response prevention

involves exposing clients to situations that produce anxiety or obsessive fears but instructing them to resist performing the compulsive behaviors they usually feel bound to perform

Cognitive schemas

are listed as distorted/negative automatic thoughts.

Negative automatic thoughts

are described as a steady train of unpleasant thoughts suggesting inadequacy and hopelessness

Psychoeducation

is a treatment component listed under cognitive therapies

GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid)

is a common neurotransmitter that carries inhibitory messages in the brain; when received at a receptor, it causes the neuron to stop firing, helping anxiety to subside

Benzodiazepines

(e.g., Xanax, Valium) are drugs that provide relief from anxiety. They are sedative-hypnotic drugs that bind to GABA receptors, increasing GABA's ability to stop neurons from firing and thereby improving the functioning of the fear circuit

Antidepressants

are drugs used to treat anxiety disorders, often by increasing the activity of serotonin and norepinephrine

Major Depressive Episode

is a period of two or more weeks marked by at least five symptoms of depression, including depressed mood most of the day or diminished interests or pleasure

Manic Episode

is a display of continually irregular, inflated, unrestrained, or irritable mood and heightened activity or energy for one week or more, along with at least three other specific symptoms

Hypomanic Episode

is similar to a manic episode but less severe, resulting in no clear social or occupational impairment

Major Depressive Disorder (MDD)

involves the presence of one or more major depressive episodes, with no history of a manic or hypomanic episode

Persistent Depressive Disorder

involves experiencing symptoms of major or mild depression for two years or more, with symptoms not absent for more than two months at a time, and no history of mania or hypomania.

Bipolar I Disorder

involves the occurrence of a full manic episode; hypomanic or major depressive episodes may precede or follow the manic episode

Bipolar II Disorder

involves the presence or history of major depressive episode(s) and hypomanic episode(s), but no history of a full manic episode

Cyclothymic Disorder

involves less severe but more frequent mood changes, specifically numerous periods of hypomanic symptoms and mild depressive symptoms, continuing for two or more years

Monoamine hypothesis

is a theory regarding the biological role of monoamine neurotransmitters (like norepinephrine and serotonin) in depression

MAOIs (monoamine oxidase inhibitors)

are medications that inhibit the production of the enzyme monoamine oxidase, thereby increasing the activity level of neurotransmitters like serotonin and norepinephrine.

Tricyclics

are antidepressant drugs that share a three-ring molecular structure and reduce depression by inhibiting the overly vigorous reuptake processes of norepinephrine or serotonin, allowing them to remain in the synapse longer

SSRIs

(selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) are second-generation antidepressants that increase serotonin activity, largely without affecting norepinephrine or other neurotransmitters.

SNRIs

(serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors) are second-generation antidepressants that increase both serotonin and norepinephrine activity

Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT)

is a brain stimulation procedure involving passing electricity through the brain to induce a seizure, used for severe unipolar depression

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)

is a non-pharmacological brain stimulation technique where a clinician uses an electromagnetic coil to send a current into the prefrontal cortex to increase neuron activity

Negative cognitive triad

(part of hopelessness theory) is the repeated interpretation of one's experiences, oneself, and one's future in negative ways, leading to depression

Behavioral activation

is a therapeutic approach that systematically works to increase the number of constructive and rewarding activities and events in a client’s life

Attribution helplessness

is the belief, developed when people view events as beyond their control, that their present lack of control is due to some internal cause that is both global and stable, making them feel helpless to prevent future negative outcomes and leading to depression

Lithium

is a mood-stabilizing drug used to treat bipolar disorder

Anticonvulsants and atypical antipsychotics

are medications used as alternative mood stabilizers for bipolar disorders.

Anorexia Nervosa (AN)

involves purposeful, restricted energy intake resulting in significantly low body weight, coupled with an intense fear of or behavior preventing weight gain, and a distorted body perception or self-evaluation influenced by body weight/shape

Restricting type (AN)

involves reducing weight primarily by restricting food intake

Binge eating/purging type (AN)

involves losing weight by forcing oneself to vomit after meals, abusing laxatives or diuretics, or engaging in eating binges

Bulimia Nervosa (BN)

is characterized by recurrent binge eating followed by recurrent inappropriate compensatory behaviors (like forced vomiting, misusing laxatives/diuretics, fasting, or excessive exercise) to prevent weight gain. Both bingeing and compensatory behaviors must occur at least once per week for three months

Binge eating

is an episode over a limited time (often two hours) during which a person eats much more food than most people would eat, while feeling unable to stop eating

Binge Eating Disorder

involves frequent eating binges where people feel no control over eating, but they do not perform inappropriate compensatory behaviors

Stressor

is an event creating a demand or threat

Stress response

is the physiological and psychological reaction to a stressor

Trauma

is an emotionally overwhelming experience. A traumatic event is exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violation

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

involves symptoms of arousal, anxiety, and depression persisting for longer than a month after a traumatic event. Symptoms include intrusive re-experiencing of the event (memories, dreams, flashbacks), avoidance of trauma-linked cues, negative changes in cognitions and mood, and increased arousal or reactivity

Acute Stress Disorder

involves symptoms that begin within four weeks of the traumatic event and last for less than one month

Dissociative Amnesia

is the inability to recall important personal information, usually of a stressful nature, about one's life. The memory loss is more extensive than typical forgetting and is not caused by physical factors

Dissociative Identity Disorder (D.I.D.)

is a disruption of identity characterized by two or more distinct identity states (subpersonalities) and memory disruption (gaps regarding daily events, key personal information, or traumatic events)

Posttraumatic model

(DID explanation) posits that the disorder is caused by childhood trauma and coping mechanisms

Sociocognitive model

(DID explanation) suggests the disorder is caused by social reinforcement and meaning making.

Iatrogenic

refers to a condition caused by treatment and treatment professionals

State dependent learning

is a cognitive explanation suggesting that if people learn something in a particular state of mind/arousal, they are likely to remember it best when they are again in that same condition.