PSYCH: MENTAL STATUS EXAM DISTURBANCES

Automatism

Repeated purposeless behaviors often indicative of anxiety.

Automatism

Drumming of fingers, twisting locks of hair, pacing, rocking, or tapping the foot.

Pyschomotor retardation

Overall slowed movement.

Echopraxia

Purposely imitates movements by others.

Waxy flexibility

Maintenance of posture or position over time even when it is awkward.

Mutism

Extreme form of negativism; inability or refusal to speak when client is aware of environment.

May occur from conscious or unconscious reasons.

Circumstantiality

Beating around the bush; giving unnecessary detail that delays meeting a goal or stating a point.

Circumstantiality

May be evidenced if the client gives unnecessary
details or strays from the topic but eventually provides the requested information.

Circumstantiality

A client eventually answers a question but only after giving excessive unnecessary detail

Perseveration

Persistent adherence to a single idea or topic; verbal repetition of a sentence, word, or phrase; resisting attempts to change the topic.

Flight of ideas

Continuous flow of verbalization in which the person jumps rapidly from one topic to another.

Flight of ideas

Excessive amount and rate of speech composed of fragmented or unrelated ideas

Loose associations

Fragmented or poorly related thoughts and ideas.

Loose associations

Disorganized thinking that jumps from one idea to another with little or no evident relation between the thoughts (vague to no connection)

Thought blocking

Sudden cessation of thought

Thought blocking

Stopping abruptly in the middle of a sentence or train of thought; sometimes unable to continue the idea

Thought broadcasting

A delusional belief that others can hear or know what the client is thinking

Thought insertion

A delusional belief that others are putting ideas or thoughts into the client's head—that is, the ideas are not those of the client

Thought withdrawal

A delusional belief that others are taking the client's thoughts away and the client is powerless to stop it

Echolalia

Repeating exactly what is heard.

Neologism

Inventing words only the client understands.

Verbigeration

The stereotyped repetition of words or phrases that may or may not have meaning to the listener.

Pressured speech

Unrelenting, rapid, often loud talking without pauses.

Clang associations

Change of words is governed by sound; rhyming.

Word salad

Group of words that are grouped together randomly, without any logical connection.

Tangentiality

Wandering off the topic and never providing the information requested

Stilted language

Use of words or phrases that are flowery, excessive, amd pompous.

Poverty of speech

Inability to formulate and articulate thoughts that are relevant to the discussion; very limited vocabulary.

Delusion

A fixed false belief not based in reality

Delusion

Disturbance in thought process and content

Hallucination

Sensory perceptions that have no external stimuli.

Hallucination

Perceptual disturbances

Illusion

Misperception or misinterpretations of an external stimuli.

Magical thinking

Belief that thoughts or behavior have control over specific situations or people.

Magical thinking

Normal in preschool

Paranoia

Extreme suspiciousness of others and of their actions or perceived intenrions.

Religiosity

Excessive demonstration of or obsession with religious ideas and behavior.

Phobias

Irrational fear of a specific object or situation.

Obsession

Maladaptive persistent patterns or thought, images, or feelings that generate anxiety.

Compulsion

Maladaptive urges to act on impulse (ritualistic behaviors)

Inappropriate affect

Facial expressions which are incongruent with mood or situation.

Blunted affect

Showing little or a slow-to-respond facial expression.

Restricted affect

Displaying one type of expression, usually serious or somber.

Labile mood

Unpredictable and rapidly changing mood (from depressed to crying to euphoria)

Apathy

Lack of concern or disinterest; inability to generate a normal responses to people, situations or environment.

Dissociation

Removal from conscious awareness of painful feelings, memories, thought or aspects of identity.

Ambivalence

Co-existence of opposite emotions toward the same object, person, or situation.

Anhedonia

Inability to experience joy or pleasure.