Key Concepts in Abnormal Psychology and Psychotherapy

Behavioral inhibition system (BIS):

Brain circuit in the limbic system that responds to threat signals by inhibiting activity and causing anxiety.

Abnormal behavior

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

Behavior therapy

Array of therapy methods based on the principles of behavioral and cognitive science, as well as principles of learning as applied to clinical problems. It considers specific behaviors rather than inferred conflicts as legitimate targets for change.

Behaviorism

Explanation of human behavior, including dysfunction, based on principles of learning and adaptation derived from experimental psychology.

Castration anxiety

In psychoanalysis, the fear in young boys that they will be mutilated genitally because of their lust for their mothers.

Catharsis

Rapid or sudden release of emotional tension thought to be an important factor in psychoanalytic therapy.

Classical conditioning

Fundamental learning process first described by Ivan Pavlov. An event that automatically elicits a response is paired with another stimulus event that does not (a neutral stimulus). After repeated pairings, the neutral stimulus becomes a conditioned stimulus that by itself can elicit the desired response.

Clinical description

Details of the combination of behaviors, thoughts, and feelings of an individual that make up a particular disorder.

Cognitive-behavioral model

Model that combines insights from the behavioral, cognitive, and social learning models, which brought the systematic development of a more scientific approach to the psychological aspects of psychopathology.

Collective unconscious

Accumulated wisdom of a culture collected and remembered across generations, a psychodynamic concept introduced by Carl Jung.

Course

Pattern of development and change of a disorder over time.

Defense mechanisms

Common patterns of behavior, often adaptive coping styles when they occur in moderation, observed in response to particular situations. In psychoanalysis, these are thought to be unconscious processes originating in the ego.

Dream analysis

Psychoanalytic therapy method in which dream contents are examined as symbolic of id impulses and intrapsychic conflicts.

Ego

In psychoanalysis, the psychical entity responsible for finding realistic and practical ways to satisfy id drives.

Ego psychology

Derived from psychoanalysis, this theory emphasizes the role of the ego in development and attributes psychological disorders to failure of the ego to manage impulses and internal conflicts. Also known as self-psychology.

Etiology

Cause or source of a disorder.

Exorcism

Religious ritual that attributes disordered behavior to possession by demons and seeks to treat the individual by driving the demons from the body.

Extinction

Learning process in which a response maintained by reinforcement in operant conditioning or pairing in classical conditioning decreases when that reinforcement or pairing is removed; also the procedure of removing that reinforcement or pairing.

Free association

Psychoanalytic therapy technique intended to explore threatening material repressed into the unconscious. The patient is instructed to say whatever comes to mind without censoring.

Id

In psychoanalysis, the unconscious psychical entity present at birth representing basic sexual and aggressive drives.

Incidence

Number of new cases of a disorder appearing during a specific period (compare with prevalence).

Intrapsychic conflicts

In psychoanalysis, the struggles among the id, ego, and superego.

Introspection

Early, nonscientific approach to the study of psychology involving systematic attempts to report thoughts and feelings that specific stimuli evoked.

Mental disorder

See psychological disorder.

Mental hygiene movement

Mid-19th-century effort to improve care of the mentally disordered by informing the public of their mistreatment.

Moral therapy

Psychosocial approach in the 19th century that involved treating patients as normally as possible in normal environments.

Neurosis

Obsolete psychodynamic term for psychological disorder thought to result from unconscious conflicts and the anxiety they cause. Plural is neuroses.

Object relations

Modern development in psychodynamic theory involving the study of how children incorporate the memories and values of people who are close and important to them.

Person-centered therapy

Therapy method in which the client, rather than the counselor, primarily directs the course of discussion, seeking self-discovery and self-responsibility.

Phobia

A psychological disorder characterized by marked and persistent fear of an object or situation.

Presenting problem

Original complaint reported by the client to the therapist. The actual treated problem may sometimes be a modification derived from the presenting problem.

Prevalence

Number of people displaying a disorder in the total population at any given time (compare with incidence).

Prognosis

Predicted future development of a disorder over time.

Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalytic assessment and therapy, which emphasizes exploration of, and insight into, unconscious processes and conflicts, pioneered by Sigmund Freud.

Psychoanalyst

Therapist who practices psychoanalysis after earning either an M.D. or a Ph.D. degree and receiving additional specialized postdoctoral training.

Psychoanalytic model

Complex and comprehensive theory originally advanced by Sigmund Freud that seeks to account for the development and structure of personality, as well as the origin of abnormal behavior, based primarily on inferred inner entities and forces.

Psychodynamic psychotherapy

Contemporary version of psychoanalysis that still emphasizes unconscious processes and conflicts but is briefer and more focused on specific problems.

Psychological disorder

Psychological dysfunction associated with distress or impairment in functioning that is not a typical or culturally expected response.

Psychopathology

Scientific study of psychological disorders.

Psychosexual stages of development

In psychoanalysis, the sequence of phases a person passes through during development. Each stage is named for the location on the body where id gratification is maximal at that time.

Psychosocial treatment

Treatment practices that focus on social and cultural factors (such as family experience), as well as psychological influences. These approaches include cognitive, behavioral, and interpersonal methods.

Reinforcement

In operant conditioning, consequences for behavior that strengthen it or increase its frequency. Positive reinforcement involves the contingent delivery of a desired consequence. Negative reinforcement is the contingent escape from an aversive consequence. Unwanted behaviors may result from their reinforcement or the failure to reinforce desired behaviors.

Scientist-practitioners

Mental health professionals who are expected to apply scientific methods to their work. They must keep current in the latest research on diagnosis and treatment, they must evaluate their own methods for effectiveness, and they may generate their own research to discover new knowledge of disorders and their treatment.

Self-actualizing

Process emphasized in humanistic psychology in which people strive to achieve their highest potential against difficult life experiences.

Self-psychology

See ego psychology.

Shaping

In operant conditioning, the development of a new response by reinforcing successively more similar versions of that response. Both desirable and undesirable behaviors may be learned in this manner.

Superego

In psychoanalysis, the psychical entity representing the internalized moral principles of parents and society.

Systematic desensitization

Behavioral therapy technique to diminish excessive fears, involving gradual exposure to the feared stimulus paired with a positive coping experience, usually relaxation.

Transference

Psychoanalytic concept suggesting that clients may seek to relate to the therapist as they do to important authority figures, particularly their parents.

Unconditional positive regard

Acceptance by the counselor of the client's feelings and actions without judgment or condemnation.

Unconscious

Part of the psychic makeup that is outside the awareness of the person.

Action potentials

Short periods of electrical activity at the membrane of a neuron, responsible for the transmission of signals within the neuron.

Affect

Conscious, subjective aspect of an emotion that accompanies an action at a given time.

Agonist

Chemical substance that effectively increases the activity of a neurotransmitter by imitating its effects.

Antagonist

In neuroscience, a chemical substance that decreases or blocks the effects of a neurotransmitter.

Brain circuits

The neurotransmitter currents or neural pathways in the brain.

Brain-gut connection

The influence of the gut bacteria on physical and mental health.

Circumplex model of emotions

A model describing different emotions as points in a two-dimensional space of valence and arousal.

Cognitive science

Field of study that examines how humans and other animals acquire, process, store, and retrieve information.

Diathesis-stress model

A hypothesis that both an inherited tendency (a vulnerability) and specific stressful conditions are required to produce a disorder.

Dopamine

Neurotransmitter whose generalized function is to activate other neurotransmitters and to aid in exploratory and pleasure-seeking behaviors (thus balancing serotonin). A relative excess of dopamine is implicated in schizophrenia (although contradictory evidence suggests the connection is not simple), and its deficit is involved in Parkinson's disease.

Emotion

Pattern of action elicited by an external event and a feeling state, accompanied by a characteristic physiological response.

Epigenetics

The study of factors other than inherited DNA sequence, such as new learning or stress, that alter the phenotypic expression of genes.

Equifinality

Developmental psychopathology principle that a behavior or disorder may have several causes.

Excitatory

Causing excitation; activating.

Flight or fight response

Biological reaction to alarming stressors that musters the body's resources (for example, blood flow and respiration) to resist or flee a threat.

Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA)

A neurotransmitter that reduces activity across the synapse and thus inhibits a range of behaviors and emotions, especially generalized anxiety.

Gene-environment correlation model

A hypothesis that people with a genetic predisposition for a disorder may also have a genetic tendency to create environmental risk factors that promote the disorder.

Genes

Long deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) molecules, the basic physical units of heredity that appear as locations on chromosomes. A single gene is a subunit of DNA that determines inherited traits in living things.

Glutamate

Amino acid neurotransmitter that excites many different neurons, leading to action.

Hormone

Chemical messenger produced by the endocrine glands.

Implicit memory

Condition of memory in which a person cannot recall past events despite acting in response to them (contrast with explicit memory).

Inhibitory

Causing inhibition; suppressing.

Inverse agonist

Chemical substance that produces effects opposite those of a particular neurotransmitter.

Learned helplessness

Martin Seligman's theory that people become anxious and depressed when they make an attribution that they have no control over the stress in their lives (whether or not they do in reality).

Microbiota

Entirety of the microorganisms (such as fungi, viruses, and bacteria) that populate the intestines. The combined genome of these organisms is called the microbiome. The influence of the microbiome of the gut on psychological well-being is called the psychobiome.

Modeling

(also known as observational learning) Learning through observation and imitation of the behavior of other individuals and consequences of that behavior.

Mood

Enduring period of emotionality.

Multidimensional integrative approach

Approach to the study of psychopathology that holds psychological disorders as always being the products of multiple interacting causal factors.

Neuron

Individual nerve cell; responsible for transmitting information.

Neuroscience

Study of the nervous system and its role in behavior, thoughts, and emotions.

Neurotransmitters

Chemicals that cross the synaptic cleft between nerve cells to transmit impulses from one neuron to the next. Their relative excess or deficiency is involved in several psychological disorders.

Norepinephrine (also noradrenaline)

The neurotransmitter active in the central and peripheral nervous systems, controlling heart rate, blood pressure, and respiration, among other functions. Because of its role in the body's alarm reaction, it may also contribute generally and indirectly to panic attacks and other disorders.

Prepared learning

An ability that has been adaptive for evolution, allowing certain associations to be learned more readily than others.

Reuptake

Action by which a neurotransmitter is quickly drawn back into the discharging neuron after being released into a synaptic cleft.

Serotonin

A neurotransmitter involved in processing of information and coordination of movement, as well as inhibition and restraint. It also assists in the regulation of eating, sexual, and aggressive behaviors, all of which may be involved in different psychological disorders. Its interaction with dopamine is implicated in schizophrenia.

Synaptic cleft

Space between nerve cells where chemical transmitters act to move impulses from one neuron to the next.

Terminal button

The end of an axon (of a neuron) where neurotransmitters are stored before release.

Vulnerability

A susceptibility or tendency to develop a disorder.

Behavioral assessment

Measuring, observing, and systematically evaluating (rather than inferring) the client's thoughts, feelings, and behavior in the actual problem situation or context.

Classical categorical approach

A classification method founded on the assumption of clear-cut differences among disorders, each with a different known cause.

Classification

Assignment of objects or people to categories on the basis of shared characteristics.

Clinical assessment

Systematic evaluation and measurement of psychological, biological, and social factors in a person presenting with a possible psychological disorder.

Comorbidity

Presence of two or more disorders in an individual at the same time.

Diagnosis

Process of determining whether a presenting problem meets the established criteria for a specific psychological disorder.

Dimensional approach

Method of categorizing characteristics on a continuum rather than on a binary, either-or, or all-or-none basis.

Electroencephalogram (EEG)

Measure of electrical activity patterns in the brain, taken through electrodes placed on the scalp.

False negative

Assessment error in which no pathology is noted (that is, test results are negative) when one is actually present.

False positive

Assessment error in which pathology is reported (that is, test results are positive) when none is actually present.

Familial aggregation

The extent to which a disorder is found among a patient's relatives.