Anxiety Disorders Vocabulary

Vocabulary flashcards based on lecture material covering anxiety disorders, diagnostic criteria, associated features, and behavioral/cognitive treatments.

Fear

The emotional response to real or perceived imminent threat, associated with surges of autonomic arousal necessary for fight or flight, thoughts of immediate danger, and escape behaviors.

Anxiety

The anticipation of future threat, associated with muscle tension, vigilance in preparation for future danger, and cautious or avoidant behaviors.

Separation Anxiety Disorder

An anxiety disorder involving developmentally inappropriate and excessive fear or anxiety concerning separation from attachment figures, lasting at least 4 weeks in children and adolescents and typically 6 months or more in adults.

Selective Mutism

A disorder characterized by a consistent failure to speak in specific social situations where there is an expectation to speak (e.g., school), despite speaking in other situations, lasting for at least 1 month.

Specific Phobia

An anxiety disorder marked by an irrational, persistent (typically lasting 6 months or more), and unabating fear or anxiety about a circumscribed object, activity, or situation.

Vasovagal Fainting Response

A physiological response seen in blood-injection-injury specific phobia, marked by an initial brief acceleration of heart rate and elevation of blood pressure followed by a deceleration of heart rate and a drop in blood pressure.

Social Anxiety Disorder

An anxiety disorder characterized by marked fear, anxiety, or avoidance regarding one or more social situations involving exposure to potential scrutiny by others, driven by fear of negative evaluation.

Panic Attack

An abrupt surge of intense fear or intense discomfort that reaches a peak within minutes, accompanied by four or more physical and/or cognitive symptoms.

Panic Disorder

An anxiety disorder characterized by recurrent unexpected panic attacks followed by at least 1 month of persistent concern or worry about additional attacks or maladaptive behavioral changes.

Agoraphobia

An anxiety disorder involving intense fear or anxiety triggered by real or anticipated exposure to two or more of five specific situations due to thoughts that escape might be difficult or help unavailable in the event of panic-like or incapacitating symptoms.

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

An anxiety disorder characterized by persistent and excessive anxiety and worry about various domains occurring more days than not for at least 6 months, which the individual finds difficult to control.

Coulrophobia

An unusual specific phobia defined as the fear of clowns.

Anxiety Sensitivity Theory

The belief that panic disorder is caused in part by the tendency to interpret cognitive and somatic manifestations of stress and anxiety in a catastrophic manner.

Conditioned Fear Reactions

Acquired associations between an internal or external cue and feelings of intense anxiety.

Flooding

A behavioral technique in which the client is immersed in the sensation of anxiety by being exposed to the feared situation in its entirety.

In Vivo Flooding

A behavioral technique in which the client is immersed in the actual feared situation.

Imaginal Flooding

A behavioral technique in which the client is immersed through imagination into the feared situation.

Graded In Vivo

A behavioral procedure in which clients gradually expose themselves to increasingly challenging anxiety-provoking situations.

Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy (VRET)

A method of exposure therapy that uses virtual reality, in which clients become immersed in computer-generated environments that resemble the situations they fear.

Systematic Desensitization

An exposure therapy method that presents the client with progressively more anxiety-provoking images while simultaneously training them to relax.

Panic-Control Therapy (PCT)

A treatment combining cognitive restructuring, exposure to bodily cues associated with panic attacks, and breathing retraining to help individuals control panic symptoms.

Relaxation Training

A behavioral technique used in the treatment of anxiety disorders that involves progressive and systematic patterns of muscle tensing and relaxing.