Unit 8: Clinical Psychology

Agoraphobia

Agoraphobia

fear or avoidance of situations, such as crowds or wide open places, where one has felt loss of control and panic

Antisocial Personality Disorder

lack of remorse or empathy toward others, disregard for social norms

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)

A type of neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by inattentiveness, and inability to maintain focus or concentrate on tasks. This may impair social, or academic functioning.

Autism Spectrum Disorder

A neurodevelopmental disorder marked by a spectrum of potential impairments to communication and social interactions. This is generally marked by restrictive an repetitive behaviors, inability to make eye contact and is diagnosed in early childhood.

Avoidant Personality Disorder

A personality disorder characterized by consistent discomfort and restraint in social situations, overwhelming feelings of inadequacy, and extreme sensitivity to negative evaluation.

Bipolar Disorder

A mood disorder in which the person alternates between the hopelessness and lethargy of depression and the overexcited state of mania.

Borderline Personality Disorder

a personality disorder characterized by lack of stability in interpersonal relationships, self-image, and emotion; impulsivity; angry outbursts; intense fear of abandonment

Comorbid

A term used to describe when an individual is diagnosed with two or more mental illnesses simultaneously.

Compulsion

engaging in repetitive actions or rituals in order to reduce anxiety.

Delusion

A characteristic associated with schizophrenia that involves a false belief or perception.

Dissociative Amnesia

Dissociative disorder characterized by the sudden and extensive inability to recall important personal information, usually of a traumatic or stressful nature.

Dissociative Disorders

A category of mental disorders characterized by a loss in memory, identity, or consciousness.

Dissociative Fugue

A symptom that may be found with dissociative amnesia but that involves sudden travel in addition to a lack of personal identity or memory of episodic events.

Dissociative Identity Disorder

A type of dissociative disorder involving the presence of two or more distinct identities that alternatively take over one's behavior and thoughts.

DSM-5

A reference book created by the American Psychiatric Association which presents classifications and diagnostic criteria for mental disorders.

Flat Affect

Involves the loss of emotional reactions. This is often associated with schizophrenia or major depression.

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

A type of anxiety disorder that involves feelings of fear, worry, and apprehension without knowing the origin for the cause of the concern.

Hallucination

A false sensory experience associated with schizophrenia. The most common type is auditory in which a person hears voices that are not there.

Hoarding Disorder

A type of obsessive-compulsive disorder characterized by the inability to discard useless or trivial belongings for fear that they might be needed in the future.

Insanity

A legal term that indicates an individual cannot be held criminally responsible for their actions

Major Depressive Disorder

a mood disorder in which a person feels sad and hopeless for weeks or months

Mania

A state of hyperactivity, decreased need for sleep, and feelings of invincibility seen during the manic phase of bipolar disorder

Narcissistic Personality Disorder

A type of personality disorder characterized by an inflated sense of self.

Obsession

The cognitive component of an obsessive-compulsive disorder which involves the presence of unwanted thoughts, images, or ideas.

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

A category of disorders characterized by uncontrollable anxiety producing thoughts and/or repetitive and ritualized behaviors to reduce those the anxiety.

Panic Attack

A sudden overwhelming sense of worry and terror accompanied by a racing heart, difficulty breathing and fear that something terrible will occur.

Panic Disorder

A type of anxiety disorder that involves recurrent, unexpected panic attacks and the continual fear or worry of future panic attacks.

Paranoid Personality Disorder

A type of personality disorder characterized by a unwarranted pattern of mistrust and suspicion of others.

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

a disorder characterized by haunting memories, nightmares, social withdrawal, jumpy anxiety, numbness of feeling, and/or insomnia that lingers for four weeks or more after a traumatic experience

Psychosis

Often associated with schizophrenia and is characterized by a loss of touch with reality. Often this loose of touch with reality is accompanied by hallucinations and/or delusions.

Schizophrenia

Dissociative Disorder. Symptoms may include delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech or lack of emotional response.

Specific Phobia

A type of anxiety disorder involving fear and avoidance related to a particular object or situation.

Word Salad

A potential characteristic of schizophrenia that involves disorganized speech in which words are nearly incomprehensible

Antidepressant Drugs

A class of drugs designed to elevate mood by altering levels of neurotransmitters (serotonin) at receptor sites. Blocks reuptake of serotonin

Antipsychotic Drugs

A class of drugs designed to treat the positive symptoms of schizophrenia such as hallucinations and delusions by limiting the amount of dopamine available at receptor sites.

Behavioral Therapy

A group of therapies that use learning techniques such as operant and classical conditioning to improve human functioning. Examples include token economy and systematic desensitization.

Benzodiazepines

The most common group of antianxiety drugs, which includes Valium and Xanax. Increases levels of GABA at receptor sites.

Client-Centered Therapy

a humanistic therapy, developed by Carl Rogers, in which the therapist uses techniques such as active listening within a genuine, accepting, empathic environment to facilitate clients' growth.

Cognitive Therapy

A type of therapy which focuses primarily on helping individuals eliminate maladaptive ways of thinking and replace them with more realistic and reasonable perceptions of the world.

Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT)

A type of biomedical therapy that involves running a current across electrodes placed on the head of a patient. This has been used as an effective treatment for severe depression

Flooding

a treatment for phobias in which clients are exposed repeatedly and intensively to a feared object and made to see that it is actually harmless

Group Therapy

A type of therapy in which two or more individuals and a facilitator interact with one another to share their common challenges and work together to overcome the barriers these challenges have created in their daily functioning.

Insight Therapy

Humanist therapy - helps people better understand the reasons for their behavior to achieve personal growth

Lithium

A type of drug often used to treat bipolar disorder

Psychopharmacology

using drugs to treat psychological disorders

Psychosurgery

A controversial treatment involving efforts to reduce the effects of mental disorders by surgical intervention on parts of the brain.

Systematic Desensitization

gradual exposure to a phobia or source of anxiety