Psychological Disorders

Normal Versus Abnormal

  • Defining Abnormality:
    • Deviation from average behavior.
    • Deviation from an ideal.
    • Producing personal discomfort.
    • Inability to function effectively.
    • Legal concept.
    • Abnormal behavior causes distress and impairs daily functioning.

Perspectives on Abnormality

  • Medical: Abnormal behavior stems from physical issues like hormonal imbalances or brain injuries.
  • Psychoanalytic: Abnormal behavior arises from childhood conflicts.
  • Behavioral: Environmental rewards and punishments shape abnormal behavior.
  • Cognitive: Thoughts and beliefs are central to abnormal behavior.
  • Humanistic: Emphasizes personal responsibility for behavior.
  • Sociocultural: Society and culture shape behavior.

Classifying Abnormal Behavior: DSM-5

  • Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) is a system to classify and define psychological disorders.
    • Devised by the American Psychiatric Association.
    • Takes an atheoretical approach to identifying disorders.
  • Benefits:
    • Provides a descriptive system.
    • Improves communication between professionals.
    • Enables research into causes.
    • Provides a shorthand for describing co-occurring behaviors.
  • Shortcomings:
    • May lead to overlooking other diagnostic possibilities after initial diagnosis.

Categories of Disorders

  • Anxiety Disorders: Generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, phobic disorder.
  • Somatic Symptom and Related Disorders: Illness anxiety disorder, conversion disorder.
  • Dissociative Disorders: Dissociative identity disorder, dissociative amnesia, dissociative fugue.
  • Mood Disorders: Major depressive disorders, bipolar disorder.
  • Schizophrenia Spectrum and Other Psychotic Disorders: Delusional disorder.
  • Personality Disorders: Antisocial personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder.
  • Sexual Disorders: Paraphilic disorders, sexual dysfunction.
  • Substance-Related Disorders: Alcohol, cocaine, hallucinogens, marihuana.
  • Neurocognitive Disorders: Alzheimer’s.

Anxiety Disorders

  • Anxiety disorder: Anxiety without an obvious external cause that affects daily functioning.
  • Phobic disorder: Intense, irrational fears of specific objects or situations.
  • Panic disorder: Panic attacks lasting from seconds to hours without specific triggers.
  • Generalized anxiety disorder: Long-term, persistent anxiety and worry with physiological symptoms.

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

  • Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD): Obsessions or compulsions.

Causes of Anxiety Disorders and OCD

  • Genetic factors, overactive autonomic nervous system, brain differences.
  • Learned response to stress (behavioral perspective).
  • Inappropriate thoughts and beliefs (cognitive perspective).

Somatic Symptom Disorders

  • Somatic symptom disorders: Psychological difficulties that take on a physical form without medical cause.
  • Illness anxiety disorder: Constant fear of illness and preoccupation with health.
  • Conversion disorder: Physical disturbance without biological reason.

Dissociative Disorders

  • Dissociative disorders: Separation of facets of personality that are normally integrated.
  • Dissociative identity disorder (DID): Two or more distinct personalities.
  • Dissociative amnesia: Significant, selective memory loss.
  • Dissociative fugue: Amnesia with sudden departure and new identity.

Mood Disorders

  • Mood disorder: Disturbance in emotional experience interfering with daily life.
  • Major depressive disorder: Severe depression affecting concentration and sociability; more prevalent in women.
  • Mania: Extended state of intense elation.
  • Bipolar disorder: Alternation between mania and depression.

Causes of Mood Disorders

  • Genetic and biological factors.
  • Environmental stresses.
  • Cognitive and emotional factors like learned helplessness.

Schizophrenia

  • Schizophrenia: Severe distortion of reality.
  • Decline from a previous level of functioning.
  • Disturbances of thought and speech.
  • Delusions and Hallucinations.
  • Inappropriate emotions and Withdrawal.

Types of Schizophrenia

  • Process schizophrenia: Slow, subtle symptom development.
  • Reactive schizophrenia: Sudden, conspicuous symptoms.
  • Positive-symptom schizophrenia: Hallucinations, delusions, emotional extremes.
  • Negative-symptom schizophrenia: Disruptions to normal emotions and behaviors.

Causes of Schizophrenia

  • Genetic factors, biochemical imbalances (dopamine hypothesis), structural abnormalities in the brain.
  • Expressed emotion within families that can be situational causes.

Personality Disorders

  • Personality disorder: Inflexible, maladaptive behavior patterns.
  • Antisocial personality disorder: Disregard for moral rules and others’ rights.
  • Borderline personality disorder: Problems regulating emotions and unstable relationships.
  • Narcissistic personality disorder: Exaggerated self-importance and lack of empathy.

Disorders That Impact Childhood

  • Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD): Inattention, impulsiveness, and inappropriate activity.
  • Autism spectrum disorder: Impaired communication and social ability, with Asperger’s syndrome as a variant.

Other Disorders

  • Psychoactive substance-use disorder: Problems from drug use and abuse.
  • Eating disorders: Anorexia nervosa, bulimia, binge-eating disorder.
  • Sexual disorders: Sexual desire, arousal, and paraphilic disorders.
  • Neurocognitive disorders: Biological problems affecting thinking and behavior.

Prevalence of Psychological Disorders

  • One out of two people may experience a psychological disorder.
  • Comorbidity: Multiple, simultaneous disorders.
  • Economic disparities affect treatment globally.