PS101 EXAM PREP

Chapter 1: Overview

What is psychology?

The scientific study of mental processes and behaviour

Mental processes: activities of our brain when thinking

Behaviour: observable activities of an organism

Level of Analysis (3 levels)

Mental processes and behaviours can be studied at multiple levels of analysis:

• The brain- brain structure and function

How does stimulation of the amygdala affect aggression?

How do certain personality factors influence aggression?

• The person - thoughts and feelings

How do personality factors influence aggressive behaviour?

• The group - family, friends, culture

How does exposure to violence in the media affect aggression

Psychology roots (parents)

• Philosophy - approx. 400 BCE

Aristotle, Plato, Socrates asked questions about the mind, questioned behaviour and God.

Developed scientific methods

• Physiology - 1600’s

Descrates contemplated mind-body dualism (Nativist)

Believed mind and body were separate and connected through the pineal gland

Believed if physical brain was dead, the mind would live on

Locke argued we learn by experience (believed we are not born with anything, a blank slate)

Believed everything we learn today is because of learning

• Psychophysics - 1800s

The relationship between physical stimuli and their psychological effects

Fencher quantified mental events

Fencher quantified mental events

The early days of Psychology

Wilhelm Wundt

Opened the first ever psychology lab in 1879 in Leipzig, Germany

Made psychology a science by adding carefully measured observations and experiments

He studied consciousness

Defined consciousness as a immediate awareness

G. Stanley Hall

1883 - established the first psychology lab in North America

1887 - launched America’s first psychology journal

1892 - one of 3 & major player in establishing the American Psychological Association (APA)

James Mark Baldwin

1890 - established the first psychology lab in Canada at U of T

Heard about Wundt’s idea and was very interested - which was another student of Wundt’s

What should be the focus of Psychology?

Structuralism - led by Edward Tichener

Sough to understand the basic elements of consciousness

Relied of introspection

• Reporting on sensations and other elements of experience

• Not very scientific

The whole idea of making in objective had failed - everybody had different answer for the same thing

*playing sound of ticking clock and have to write adjectives about the clock*

Slow, monotonous, steady, faint,

Functionalism - led by William James - went to Harvard

Sought to understand the function or purpose of consciousness

Wrote principles of Psychology which was published in 1890

Led other schools of thought, behaviourism, applied psychology

Impressed by charles darwin ideas

Gestalt psychologists

• Said consciousness cannot be broken down into elements

• We perceive things as whole perceptual units

  • The whole is greater than the sum of its parts

• Learning is tied to what we perceive

We perceive the whole simulation by whole not part by part

Perspectives on Behaviour

Perspectives on behaviour: different vantage points for analyzing behaviour and its causes

Major perspectives in psychology:

• Psychoanalysis

• Behaviourism

• Humanistic psychology

• Cognitive psychology

• Psychobiology / neuroscience

Psychoanalysis

Founded by Sigmund Freud in the early 1900s

Focused on the unconscious

Drives, wishes, needs, and desires of which we are not aware

Emphasized the importance of early childhood experiences

The way resolve these unconscious is what you see on the outside- for example- personality

Behaviourism

Dominant school of thought in the early 1900s

Founded by John B. Watson

Emphasized psychology’s focus on observable behaviour

Showed that phobias can be learned

Iven Pavlov

Studied classical conditioning in dogs

B.F. Skinner

Showed how consequences of behaviour can influence future behaviour

Studied rats and pigeons- consequences of actions

Albert Bandura

Described learning by social observation

Bobo doll experiment

More cognitive/observational focused

Humanistic Psychology

Argued that psychoanalysis and behaviourism were de-humanizing

Emphasized the unique qualities of humans

Focused on freedom and personal growth

Led by Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers

Cognitive Psychology

Cognition: mental processes involved in acquiring knowledge

1950’s and 1960a: Neisser, Miller, and Chomsky

Applied the scientific method to study the mind

Became the dominant perspective in psychology

Psychobiology / neuroscience

Explained behaviour in terms of physiological processes - highly dependant on technology

• Kart Lashley (1950s)

Observed behavioural changes in rats after removing parts of their brain

• Donald Hebb (1950s)

Cell assemblies describe neural networks

• Wilder Penfield (1970s)

Mild electrical stimulation of different areas of the brain evokes different responses

• Roger Sperry (1980s)

Left and right brain functions

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Chapter 2:Overview & Appendix B

What is Science?

• Basic assumption – events are governed by some lawful order that can be observed, measured, and tested

• The scientific method is designed to help the scientific process remain as accurate and precise as possible: - psychology uses the scientific method

How Do Psychologists Conduct Research?

• Step 1- make observations, review literature

• Example - You’re working at camp and notice that kids who eat more sugar are less able to follow rules and instructions for the games and activities you create for them. Makes you wonder about the link between refined sugar consumption and hyperactivity, so you review previous studies

• What do we already know about this???

• Step 2 - develop a testable hypothesis

• Hypothesis - a tentative prediction about the relationship between two or more variable

• Variable - any measurable condition that is controlled or observed in a study

• Best if the variables are operatioanlly defined in such a way that it is testable and observable

• Example is on the slideshow(slide#6)

• Children who consume more calories from sugar will ask more questions and make more errors during activities.

• Children who eat a minimum of 3 chocolate bars per day will spend more time in time-out during activities.

• Children who consume more than 50 mg of refined sugar in a day will be less able to sit still in a chair for 15 minutes.

• Step 3- Choose participants, select the research method, collect data

• A random sample sample of participants is chosen from the population

  • Population- the entire group that is of interest to researchers

  • Sample - the portion of the population that is used the study

    • Sample bias- choosing a sample that does NOT represent your population

• To make conclusions about a population based on your sample, and avoid sampling bias, you need:

  • sample=population

• We can do this by random sampling- making sure that every individual in the population has an equal chance of being included in you sample

There are three methods of data collection psychologists on to describe the characteristics of behaviour:

• Case studies

• Naturalistics observation

• Surveys and questionnaires

The case study: an in depth investigation of a single participant using different data collection techniques

• Advantages

  • Useful method to study rare behaviours

  • Very detailed

  • Can be a source of support for the cause of?

• Disadvantages

  • Results may not generalise to other people

  • Potential for researcher bias: when they see only what they expect to see

  • Cannot determine cause and effect

The survey and questionnaire: participants are asked a series of question about certain aspects of their behaviour (written or interview)

• Advantages

  • Quick and cheap data collection

  • Good to study behaviours that cannot be observed

• Disadvantages

  • Careful of wording effects

  • Results depend on what participants themselves say

  • Potential for participant bias- when participant answer according to what they think they should say rather than truthfully

  • Cannot determine cause and effect

Naturalistic observation: observing and recording the participants natural behaviour, without influencing the participant

• Advantages

  • Behaviour studied under natural

  • Good to use in conjunction with lab experiments

• Disadvantages

  • Time consuming

  • Difficult not to influence behaviour

  • Potential for hawthorne effect: when participants act differently because they know they're being observed

  • Cannot determine cause and effect

  • Select the research method, collect data

  • There are two main types of research methods that psychologists use to test their hypotheses

    • Experimental research: research that is used to demonstrate cause and effect

      • The researcher manipulates a variable

      • There are different groups of participants, and each group is exposed to something different

      • Allows cause-effect conclusions

• Experimental research definition

  • Independent variable (iv): the variable that is manipulated

  • Dependant variable (dv): the variable that is measured

  • Experimental group: the group that receives the manipulation

  • Control group: the group that does not receive the manipulation and serves as a comparison

• Two types of groups in experimental research:

  • Need to ensure that the experimental group is the sae as the control group except for the dose of sugar consumption

  • Experimental group: Consumption of 50 mg or more of refined sugar within a 24 hour period for 7 consecutive days.

  • Measure sit-still score in the stabilimeter chair for 15 minutes

  • Control group: Consumption of less than 20 mg of refined sugar within a 24 hour period for 7 consecutive days

  • Measure sit-still score in

  • the stabilimeter chair for 15 minutes

• This is how experiments allow for cause and effect conclusions, because:

  • If only difference between the experimental and control group is the independent variable, then any difference found between groups must be caused by the independent variable

    • Example: If the only difference between our two groups of children is the amount of sugar consumption, then any difference in sit-still scores between the two groups must be caused by the sugar consumption

• Correlational research: research that asks how variables are related to each other

  • Advantages

    • Useful for studying topics that can be studied using experimental methods due to ethical/practical reasons

    • Can study behaviours under more natural conditions

  • Disadvantage

    • Does not allow causal conclusions

• Double blind procedure- neither the participants nor the researcher knows who is in which group

  • Neither the children themselves nor the person collecting the data from the sit still chair know who consumed sugar and who didn't

• Step 4: analyse the data, accept or reject the hypothesis

  • Use stats

  • If hypothesis was supported

    • Confidence in theory increases

      • Theory- a set of interrelated ideas used to explain a set of observations

    • Consider alt explanations

    • Inspect data and research methods for possible errors

  • If hypothesis was not supported

    • Confidence in theory decreases

    • Revise, refine or discard theory

• Step 5: seek scientific review, publish, replicate

  • Allows your work to be reviewed, criticised and scrutinised by other experts in the field

  • Ensures that the research you read in peer-reviewed journals is top notch

• Step 6: build a theory

  • Incorporates your results into existing theories or develop a new theory

  • Process starts over again at step 1

How do psychologists make sense of the research results

• Statistics!

  • Recall two main types of research methods:

    • Correlation research: no manipulation, the researcher just measures two variables

      • The correlation coefficient indicates if there is a relationship between the two variables, represented by the statistics “r”

• Experimental research: researcher manipulates a variable and compares performance across different groups

  • Inferential statistics: indicate if the difference between groups is meaningful

Correlations describe relations

• What can we say about the relation between variables when we know the correlation coefficient r

  • Positive correlation- when one variable increases. The other increases

  • Negative correlation- when one increases, the other decreases

  • Zero correlation- when the variation in one variable has nothing to do with variations in the other

Chapter 3:

About the brain

• Brain facts

  • Weighs 3 pounds or 1400g

    • 2 % of body weight but uses 20% of our oxygen

    • Wrinkly, greyish beige colour, feels like soft tofu

    • 75% water

    • Made up of 100+ billion neurons or brain cells

Techniques to study the brain

• Two approaches to learning about the brain

  • Study what happens when part of the brain isn't working normally

    • Case studies of brain damage, lesioning, electrical stimulation, magnetically deactivating

  • Use fancy equipment to study normal brain structure and function

    • CT scans, MRI, fMRI, PET scans, EEG, ERP, DTI

Techniques to Study the brain

• Case studies of brain damage

  • When a stroke or injury damages part of the brain, we have a chance to see the impact on the mind

• Lesioning

  • Surgical destruction of the brain tissue performed on animals

  • Has yielded some insights about less complex brain structures

    • eg : morris water

• Electrical stimulation

  • Parts of the brain and even neurons can be stimulated electrically, chemically or magnetically]

  • This can result in behaviours such as giggling, head turning or stimulated vivid recall

• Magnetically deactivating

  • Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)

    • A procedure in which an electromagnetic pulse is delivered to a specific region of the brain to temporarily inactive that region

    • Using a weaker pulse can stimulate areas and has therapeutic uses

      • Depression, gambling

• Computed tomographic scans (CT scans)

  • When a computer constructs a three dimensional x-ray image from a series of two dimensional images

• Magnetic resonance imaging scan (MRI scan)

  • Brain structure is mapped out using magnetic fields

    • Different areas of the brain are made up of slightly different molecular compositions which have different magnetic properties

    • Produces a picture of the brain that is very clear

• Functional magnetic resonance imaging scan (fmri scan)

  • It relies on the fact that oxygen is sent to the regions of the brain that are active

    • fMRI scanner can measure differences in blood oxygen over time while the person is doing a task

    • This functional map is then put on top of the structural map to get an overall map of how much each region of the brain is working on a given task

• Positron emission tomography scan (PET scan)

  • Allows us to see what part of the brain is active by tracing where a radioactive form of glucose goes while the brain performs a given task

• Electroencephalogram

  • A recording of the electrical waves sweeping across the brains surface

  • Useful for studying seizures and sleep

• Event related potential (ERP)

  • When the change in electrical activity is time locked to the presentation of a stimulus

  • Requires many trials averaged over many EEG signals to remove the fluctuations in EEG signals

• Diffusion Tensor imaging (DTI)

  • A structural neuroimaging technique that allows researchers to measure white matter pathways in the brain

    • These pathways are often damaged in individuals who suffer concussions

The nervous system

The nervous system contains two main categories of cells

• Glial cells

  • Found throughout the nervous system

  • Provides support for neurons

  • Recent evidence that they also modulate neural activity

• Neurons

  • Directly involved in communication

  • Receive, integrate, and transmit information to and from other neurons

• Four classes of glial cells:

  • Astrocytes

    • Largest glia, star shaped, many functions

  • Oligodendrocytes

    • Myelinate axons in CNS

  • Microglia

    • Response to injury or disease

  • Schwann cells

    • Myelinate axons in PNS

Neurons vary in form, location and interconnectivity within the nervous system

Parts of the neuron

• Dendrites: Branching extensions that receive inputs from other neurons

  • Many different forms, depending on type and location of neuron

  • Axon: single process that extends from the cell and represents the outburst side of the neuron

    • Can take many forms

  • Cell body: contains the metabolic machinery that maintains the neurons

Organization of cells in the cells in the nervous system:

• Neurons and glia are bunched together in various ways

The two main divisions of the nervous system

• Central Nervous system (CNS)

  • Brain and Spinal cord

  • The CNS makes decisions for the body

• Peripheral nervous system (PNS)

  • All neural pathways outside of the brain and spinal cord

  • Connects CNS with muscles, glands and sensory receptors

  • The PNS sends and receives information to and from the rest of the body

The autonomic nervous system:

• Sympathetic NS arouses (fight or flight)

  • Parasympathetic NS calms (rest and digest)

Central nervous system:

• Spinal cord:

  • Most nerves enter/leave through spinal cord

  • Spinal reflexes do not involve the brain

• Brain

  • Number of structures controlling behaviour

    • Both voluntary and involuntary

  • Two hemispheres (left & right)

    • Number of structures within and beneath

Organization of the Brain

Three major regions

• Hindbrain: survival functions

• Midbrain: sensation & action

• Forebrain: memory, thought & emotion

Each region corresponds to where they are located relative to the spinal cord

• Hindbrain:

  • Medulla:

    • Automatic survival functions

      • Breathing, blood circulation, reflexes

  • Pons:

    • Sleep and wakefulness

    • Coordinates automatic and unconscious movements

      • Swallowing, posture, facial expressions, eye movements

  • Cerebellum:

    • Balance, coordination, and timing of movements

    • Attention and emotion

  • Reticular formation:

    • A network of neurons in the brainstem

    • Enables alertness

    • Also filters incoming sensory information

Midbrain:

• Substantia nigra:

  • The nucleus from which dopamine neurons send their axons to the striatum (Forebrain)

  • Involved in movement control

    • Damaged in parkinson's

Forebrain:

• Everything above the midbrain, including the cerebral ventricles

  • Spaces in the brain filled with cerebrospinal fluid that provides nutrition and cushioning for many parts of the brain

• Composed of the:

  • Thalamus, hypothalamus, pituitary gland

  • Limbic system

  • Basal ganglia

  • Cerebral cortex

Thalamus:

• The sensory switchboard

• All sensory messages (except smell) are routed through the thalamus on the way to the cortex

• Also sends messages from the cortex to the medulla and cerebellum

Hypothalamus:

• Lies below (‘hypo) the thalamus

• Regulates body temperature

• Ensures adequate food and water intake (homeostasis)

• Involved in sex drive

• Directs the endocrine system via messages sent to the pituitary gland

Pituitary gland:

• The ‘master gland’ of the endocrine system

• Produces hormones that regulates other glands

  • Controlled by the hypothalamus

Limbic system

• An integrated network involved in emotion and memory

• Made of 4 structures

  • Amygdala

  • Hippocampus

  • Hypothalamus

  • Thalamus

• Amygdala

  • Helps process emotions, especially fear and aggression

  • Mediates memory formation for emotional events

• Hippocampus

  • Processes continuous, episodic memories

  • Important in the formation of new memories

• Basal ganglia

  • Functions in both voluntary movement and responses rewarding stimuli

• The cerebral cortex:

  • The outermost layer of the brain, 3mm thick

  • Measures 2200-2400 cm2, with many folds

    • Allows more cortical surface packed into skull

  • Made up of mostly cell bodies, which are grey in colour, so cerebral cortex often called the grey matter

  • Deeper grooves are used to define the boundaries of the four lobes found in each hemisphere

• Occipital lobe

  • Processes visual information

  • Contains the primary visual cortex, after which visual information is routed along two different pathways

    • Object recognition via temporal lobe

    • Where objects are via parietal lobe

  • Processes body sensations

  • Contains the somatosensory cortex

• Temporal lobe

  • Processes auditory information

  • Contains the primary auditory cortex

  • Contains Wernicke’s area

    • Important in speech comprehension

• Frontal lobe

  • Speech and skeletal motor functions

  • Contains the primary motor cortex

  • Contains Broca’s area

  • Contains the prefrontal cortex

    • Important in executives functions like planning, decision making, and controlling attention

• Cerebral cortex:

  • Primary motor cortex

    • Controls movement on opposite side of body of over 600 voluntary muscles

    • Laid out in a pattern represented by a motor homunculus

      • Amount of cortical space devoted to each motor area is proportional to the sensitivity of the motor function

  • Somatosensory cortex:

    • Receives sensory information from opposite side of the body

    • Laid out in a pattern represented by sensory homunculus

      • Amount of cortical space devoted to each sensory input is proportional to the sensitivity of the sensory function

  • Primary motor cortex and somatosensory cortex:

    • Topographically organised

Neural communication?

• What happens between neurons?

Resting potential:

• If an axon is not sending or receiving any signals, then it is negatively charged at about -70mV

  • Two reasons for negative charge when neuron is in this balanced, resting state:

  • Concentration gradient

    • The tendency for molecules, which are always in motion, to distribute themselves evenly in their environment

• Electrostatic pressure

  • Ions (molecules with a positive or negative) will attract or repel each other depending on their electric charge

  • Opposites attract

• Organic ions (A-)

  • Stuck inside cell

• Potassium ions (K+)

  • Flows relatively freely

  • Concentration gradient wants to push K+ outside cell

  • Electrostatic pressure wants to keep K+ inside cell

• Sodium ions (Na+)

  • Concentration gradient and electrostatic pressure want to push Na+ inside cell

• So why does Na+ stay concentrated outside the cell?

  • Difficult to move across the membrane

    • Na+ ion channels closed

  • Sodium-Potassium pump:

    • Continuously pushes three Na+ ions outside the cell in exchange for two K+ ions?

Action Potential:

• Na+ ions would rush into the cell

• This is what causes an action potential:

  • A sudden and brief increase in the permeability of the cell’s membrane to Na+

• Done with help from the voltage-gated sodium channel

  • Detects the charge separation across the membrane and opens up channels for Na+ to cross the membrane

• First, the membrane must be depolarized, or made less negative, by 10 or 20 mV

• If cell depolarization reaches a certain level, called threshold, then Na+ channels open

• Cell’s electric charge swings dramatically to the positive side, reaching a charge of + 40 mV

• Voltage-gated sodium channels close until cell returns to resting state

• Potassium channels also open, but with a bit of a lag

• Concentration gradient & electrostatic pressure work harder to force K+ ions outside the cell

• Causes cells to be hyperpolarized

All-or-none principle:

• Once a neuron’s electric charge reaches threshold and an action potential is triggered, that action potential will always occur with the same strength

  • Like the firing of a gun – once the trigger is pulled, bullet always comes out the same

• So how can our brain represent information that isn’t all-or-none, but continuous?

  • Can vary rate of firing and number of neurons firing

Neurotransmitters:

• 100-150 different neurotransmitters

  • More substances suspected

• Each has a different effect

  • Specific excitatory or inhibitory effect

  • Several linked to specific psychological phenomenon

Glutamate

• Most common inhibitory neurotransmitter

• Used by most neurons in the CNS and PNS

GABA

• Most common inhibitory neurotransmitter

• Used by approximately 30% of neurons in brain

• Epilepsy involves abnormal function GABA neurons

Acetylcholine (ACH)

• Involved in memory and muscle activity

Dopamine

• Linked with voluntary movements and positive emotions

Norepinephrine

• Important for mood stability and arousal

Serotonin

• Influences mood, eating, sleep, and sexual behaviour

From electrical to chemical to electrical:

• Action potential reaches terminal buttons

  • Eac terminal button contains many synaptic vesicles, or small, balloon like objects that contain molecules of a neurotransmitters

• Causes some of the synaptic vesicles to open

  • Neurotransmitters are released into the synaptic cleft

• Some neurotransmitters reach the postsynaptic neuron and bind with postsynaptic receptors

  • Causes specific ion channels to open, allowing a specific type of ion to pass in or out of the cell

From electrical to chemical to electrical

• Depending on what ion channels open, can cause:

  • Excitatory postsynaptic potential (EPSP)

    • If a positive ion channel opens that allow positive ions to flow into the cell, the cell will depolarize and it will be easier to reach the threshold of an action potential

  • Inhibitory postsynaptic potential (IPSP)

    • If a negative ion channel opens and negative ions are forced into the cell, the cell will hyperpolarize and it will be harder to reach threshold of an action potential

    • Can also occur if potassium channels open and k+ is forced outside the cell (leaves the cell more negative)

  • One neuron can receive many EPSPs and IPSPs at the same time

    • Not an all or none process like the action potential

    • Summed effect of EPSPs and IPSPs determine the neuron’s polarisation

  • Reuptake

    • Occurs when the terminal buttons quickly remove the neurotransmitters from the synapse

      • Can inhibit inhibitory neurons

        • Behaviour would increase

      • Excite inhibitory neurons

        • Behaviour would decrease

      • The cell body has to make sense of all these inputs:

        • Some are quick, some are long-lasting, some excitatory, some inhibitory, some big, some small, some arrive early or late, and some may cancel each other out at the dendrites

Brain Lateralization

• Hemispheric Lateralization= the fact that each hemisphere of the brain performs somewhat different functions

  • Left hemisphere

    • Language, mathematical, logical abilities

    • Positive emotions

  • Right hemisphere

    • Spatial relations, non-linguistic sounds (music), facial processing

    • Negative emotions

• Handedness and language:

• 90% of people are right-handed

  • 95% have left hemisphere language dominance

• Among those who are left-handed:

  • 50% have left hemisphere language dominance

  • 25% have right hemisphere language dominance

  • 25% have language functions in both hemispheres

• Right visual field is processed in the left hemisphere

• Left visual field is processed in the right hemisphere

• Normally hemispheres share information, but this can be prevented in split-brain patients

  • Patients with severed corpus callosum

    • Band of fibres connecting the two hemispheres

Split brain experiments:

• If present picture to right visual field, information sent to left hemisphere only

  • Can name & describe picture

• If present picture to left visual field, information sent to right hemisphere only

  • Can't name or describe picture, but can point to the picture they saw with their left hand

Brain Plasticity

• Neuroplasticity: the capacity of the brain to change and rewire itself based on individual experience

  • Rats in enriched vs impoverished environments

  • String musicians

  • Neural reorganisation after amputation

  • Rewiring in the the adult visual cortex

• Neuroplasticity: implications for recovery from brain injury

  • Chance of recovery best if injury occurred < 8 Years of age

  • Recovery better if damage is gradual as opposed to sudden

  • Left-handers have a better chance of recovering language processing than right handers

Chapter 6

Overview:

• The nature of consciousness

• Sleep and dreaming

• Hypnosis

• Psychoactive drugs

The nature of consciousness

• Consciousness = the moment-to-moment awareness of ourselves and our environment

• Several characteristics:

  • Subjective and private

  • Dynamic

  • Self-reflective

• Intimately linked with attention

• Two brain areas that are important for consciousness:

  • Thalamus: relays sensory information to the cerebral cortex

  • Cerebral cortex: responsible for being aware of one’s attention

    • Eg: patients with blindsight

• Levels of consciousness:

  • Consciousness: mental events we are currently aware of

    • Eg: reading this slide

  • Preconsciousness: outside of current awareness and easily accessed

    • Eg: what you had for dinner last night

  • Unconsciousness: information that is not easily accessed by consciousness

    • Contents of which have been debated

• Freud’s view of the unconscious:

  • Contains thoughts and memories that are too painful for consciousness

    • Contents may seep into consciousness by accident

    • No supportive evidence

• Cognitive view of the unconscious

  • Explicit vs implicit memories

    • Implicit memory = knowledge of which we are not typically aware

      • Egs: skills, classical conditioning, past experiences

  • Controlled vs automatic processing:

    • Automatic processing: processing that requires no consciousness

      • Egs: routine, well-learned tasks

Sleep and dreaming

Why do we sleep?

• Adaptive theory: says that organisms sleep for self-preservation and to stay safe from predators

• Restorative theory: says that sleep restores our brains and bodies

• Circadian rhythm: a daily, rhythmic biological cycle

  • Controlled by the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) of the hypothalamus

• Circadian rhythms influence whether we are a morning person or a night person

• Disruptions to circadian rhythms

  • Changes in season

  • Shift work jet lag

• Stages of sleep:

• Cycle through stages roughly every 90 minutes

  • Brain activity, other psychological responses change

  • Beta waves occur when awake and alert (13-24 cps)

  • Alpha waves occur when relaxed and drowsy (8-12 cps)

Stage 1

• Light sleep

• Theta waves (4-7 cps)

• Lasts few minutes

• May experience ‘body jerks’

Stage 2

• Sleep deepens, muscles more relaxed, harder to awaken

• Sleep spindles (1-2 seconds bursts of rapid brain activity)

Stage 3

• Sleep deepens

• Regular appearance of delta waves (<4 cps)

Stage 4

• Sleep deepens

• Delta waves dominate pattern

• Stage 4 and stage 3 together called “slow wave sleep”

REM sleep:

• Frequent dreaming

• Heart rate increases, breathing rapid and irregular

• Brain wave activity increases

• REM sleep paralysis

  • Difficult for voluntary muscles to contract

After stage 4 period, sleeper goes back through earlier stages

• Stage 3, stage 2, REM, stage 2, stage 3, stage 4, stage 2, REM, etc

• As the night goes on, see less Stage 4 and more REM

Special function of REM sleep

• All mammals and birds experience both REM and NREM sleep patterns

• REM sleep increases after being deprived of it

• May be vital for mental functioning, especially for learning and memory consolidation

When do we dream?

• Most dreams occur during REM sleep (more story like and vivid) but dreaming can occur in any sleep stage

What do we dream about?

• Negative or unpleasant content is common

• Content os affected by cultural background, life experiences, current concerns

Why do we dream?

• Information processing theory: says dreams involve processing information from the day

  • Could be mental realm where we can solve problems and think creatively

• Activation synthesis model of dreaming: says dreams reflect the brain’s attempt to make sense of random brain activity

• Freudian dream theory: says that dreams reflect the unconscious wishes and desires

  • Freud called dreams the “royal road to the unconscious”

  • Two types of contents in a dream:

    • Manifest content: surface story of a dream

    • Latent content: disguised psychological meaning of a dream

Types of dreams

• Nightmares: dreams filled with intense anxiety

  • Dreamers feel as though the situation is really happening

• Lucid dreams: dreams in which people fully recognize that they are dreaming

• Daydreams: fantasies that occur while one is awake and aware of eternal events and yet not fully conscious

Changes in sleep with age:

• Sleep less

• REM sleep decreases during infancy and childhood

• Time in stage 3 and 4 declines

Chronic sleep deprivation results in:

• General depressed state

• Lower immune system

• Lower ability to concentrate

• Higher incidence of accidents

• Lower productivity and higher likelihood of making mistakes

Sleep disorders

• Insomnia

  • Chronic difficulty in falling asleep, staying asleep or experiencing restful sleep

  • Most common sleep disorder

    • Affects 10-20% of population

  • Has biological, psychological and environmental causes

  • Great non-drug treatment based on learning principles

    • Pair bed with sleep and nothing else

• Narcolepsy

  • Extreme daytime sleepiness and sudden, uncontrollable sleep attacks

  • Cataplexy (sudden loss of muscle tone)

  • Cause is unknown

    • Genetic?

    • Can be selectively bred in dogs

• Sleep apnea

  • About 1-5% of population

  • Repeated cycle in which breathing stops and restarts during sleep[

  • lasts 20-40 seconds up to a minute or two

  • Severe cases: 400-500 times a night

  • Most common cause

    • Obstruction of upper airway

• Sleepwalking

  • Typically occurs during stages 3 or stages 4

  • More common among children

  • Causes

    • Hereditary, stress, alcohol, illness, medications

  • Treatment:

    • Psychotherapy, hypnosis, drugs, behavioural (walking before sleepwalking), wait to outgrow it

  • Myth

    • Waking a sleepwalker is dangerous

• Nightmare disorder

  • Experience frequent nightmares

  • Nightmares are more common when stressed and in childhood

• Night terrors

  • Frightening dreams that arouse sleeper to near panic state

  • Sleeper may flee room yet not remember event in morning

  • Typically occurs during stages 3 and 4

  • Most common during childhood

Hypnosis

Hypnosis: a state of heightened suggestibility in which some people are able to experience imagined situations as if they were real

• Hypnotic induction:

  • Process by which hypnotist leads person into hypnosis

• Hypnotic susceptibility scales:

  • Series of pass/fail suggestions read after hypnotic induction

• Posthypnotic responses:

  • A behaviour that was suggested while the person was hypnotised, but does not appear until later when a specific signal appears

• Posthypnotic amnesia:

  • When the person who was hypnotised doesn't remember anything from the hypnosis session

• Hypnotic hallucinations

  • Positive hallucinations: when a person is made to perceive something that isn't really there

  • Negative hallucinations: when a person is made to not perceive something that really is there

• Hypnotic involuntary control

  • No power to get people to act against their will

• Amazing feats?

  • No scientific evidence to support this

• Memory enhancement?

  • Mixed results from controlled experiments

  • Some memories are pseudomemories

• Pain tolerance

  • Hypnosis can help relieve pain, but so can mental imagery

Hypnosis and the brain

• Neuroimaging research suggests that the brain’s anterior cingulate cortex may be particularly involved when hypnosis is used to reduce pain

How hypnosis works

Psychoactive drugs

• Psychoactive drugs: any substance that alters mood, perception, awareness or thought

  • A pervasive part of society

Drugs and the brain

• Drugs modify brain chemistry

  • Cross blood-brain barrier

  • Alter consciousness by facilitating or inhibiting neural communication

  • Recall neural communication

    • Neurotransmitters released into synapse and bind with receptors on the dendrites of the postsynaptic neuron

    • Neurotransmitters are deactivated (eg: reuptake)

Tolerance and withdrawal

• Drug tolerance:

  • Decrease in responsivity to drug (need larger doses to feel the same effect)

  • Body attempts to maintain homeostasis

• Compensatory responses:

  • Physiological reactions opposite to that of the drug

  • Brain is adjusting to body imbalance

• Withdrawal

  • Compensatory responses after drug use is continued

Learning, tolerance and overdose

• Environment is powerful influence

  • Can become associated with drug and trigger compensatory

• Conditioned drug responses

  • Tolerance for drug influenced by familiarity of drug setting

  • In unfamiliar setting, overdose reaction can occur even when typical amount of drug is used

Myths about substance abuse

• Drug tolerance always leads to significant withdrawal

• If a drug does not produce tolerance or withdrawal, you cannot become dependent on it

• Physiological dependance is the major cause of drug addiction

Three main categories of psychoactive drugs:

1. Depressants

2. Stimulants

3. Hallucinogens

Depressants

• Decrease nervous system activity

• Moderate doses

  • Reduce feeling of anxiety

  • Produce euphoria

• High doses

  • Slow vital life processes

  • Can be fatal

• Alcohol

  • Nervous system depressants

  • Initial upper phase then brain centres become depressed

  • Increases activity of GABA (main inhibitory neurotransmitter)

  • Decreases activity glutamate (main excitatory neurotransmitter)

  • Combination creates ‘high’ and then ‘down’ phase

• Sedative-hypnotics (benzodiazepines)

  • Egs: Xanax, ativan, valium

  • Influence neurons that produce GABA

  • Produces relaxation and drowsiness, relieves anxiety

• Opioids

  • Egs: opium, heroin, morphine, codeine, methadone

  • Activates the opioid receptors in the brain, providing an analgesic effect and the related high

  • Reduces pain and emotional tension, produces pleasurable and calm feelings

Stimulants

• Increase neural firing and arouse nervous system

  • Increase BP, HR, respiration, alertness

• Amphetamines

  • Increase dopamine and norepinephrine activity

  • Continuous heavy use can produce amphetamine psychosis

  • Crystal methamphetamine is form of amphetamine

  • Ecstasy (MDMA): also a form of amphetamine

    • Interferes with serotonin reuptake

    • Produces feelings of pleasure, elation, warmth

• Cocaine:

  • Increases activity of norepinephrine and dopamine by blocking reuptake

  • Chronic use associated with increased risk of cognitive impairment and brain damage

  • Crack is chemically converted form

    • Effects are faster and more intense

• Caffeine

  • Works on adenosine neurons, which produces a sensation of increased alertness when stimulated

• Nicotine

  • Influences dopamine and acetylcholine neurons, which increases alertness and reduces stress

Hallucinogens

• Produces sensory or perceptual distortions called hallucinations

• Many derived from natural sources

• Can blur boundaries between fantasy and reality

• LSD:

  • Stimulates dopamine and serotonin receptors

  • Dramatically strengthens visual perceptions (including hallucinations) song with profound psychological and physical changes

• Cannabis (marijuana, THC)

  • Stimulates release of endorphins and dopamine

  • Produces a mixture of hallucinogenic, depressant and stimulant effects

• Psychoactive drugs activate a reward learning pathway, or ‘pleasure pathway’, in the brain

  • Reward-deficiency syndrome = says that people might abuse drugs because their reward centre is not readily activated by usual life events

Chapter 7

• What is learning?

• Classical conditioning

• Operant conditioning

• Observational conditioning

• Learning and cognition

• Factors that facilitate

What is learning?

• Two “processes of change” in our development

  • Maturation and learning

• Learning = a lasting change as a result of practice, study or experience

  • Has to be inferred from behaviour

  • Allows us to adapt to the environment

• Two types of learning:

  • Associative learning = a change as a result of experience where two or more stimuli become linked

  • Non-associative learning = learning that does not involve forming associations between stimuli

    • Involves repeated exposure to only a single stimulus or event

• Two types of non-associative learning:

  • Habituation = a decrease in the response to a stimulus after repeated exposure

    • Dishabituation = a recovery of the habituated response when exposed to a novel stimulus

  • Sensitization = an increase in the response to a stimulus after repeated exposure

• Types of associative learning:

  • Classical conditioning = associates stimuli with each other

    • When two stimuli reliably co-occur, the first stimulus can become a signal for the impending arrival of the second stimulus

      • Allows the animal to prepare for the second stimulus

  • Operant conditioning = associating responses with consequences

    • Learn what consequences are likely to come after specific responses

      • Allows the animal to adjust responses accordingly

Classical conditioning:

• Pavlov’s discovery

  • While studying digestion in dogs, Ivan pavlov found that salivation came to be triggered by neutral stimuli that reliably predicted the food such as:

    • Seeing the food or dish

    • Seeing the person who usually brought the food

    • Hearing that person’s footsteps

• Before conditioning:

  • Neutral stimulus = a stimulus which does not trigger a response

• Unconditioned stimulus = a stimulus which triggers a response naturally, before/without any conditioning

• During conditioning:

  • The bell (neutral stimulus) is repeatedly presented with the food (unconditioned stimulus)

  • After conditioning

    • The dog salivates upon hearing the bell, or the neutral stimulus becomes a conditioned stimulus

Activity: your romantic partner always uses the same shampoo. Soon, the smell of that shampoo makes you feel happy.

US- your partner

UR- feeling happy around your partner

CS= smell of shampoo

CR= feeling happy to smell of shampoo

• Acquisition = the initial stage of learning/conditioning

  • As the CS and US are paired, the strength of the CR grows

  • Timing is important - the CS should appear roughly hald a second before the US for learning to occur

• Extinction = the diminishing of a conditioned response

  • If the US stops appearing after the CS, then the CR decreases

• After extinction, may see spontaneous recovery = a return of the CR despite no further conditioning

  • Very likely to occur following a period of rest

• Stimulus generalisation = the tendency to have conditioned responses triggered by similar or related stimuli

  • Example: a child who learned to fear white rats is also afraid of white rabbits and santa's beard

    • Responds to MORE stuff

• Stimulus discrimination = the learned ability to only respond to a specific stimulus, preventing generalisation

  • Example: a child who learns to fear white rats is only afraid of white rats and not grey or black rats

    • Responds to LESS stuff

• Higher- order conditioning = when a previously conditioned stimulus functions as if it were a US for further conditioning

  • Often used in advertising where products (CSs) are paired with sexualLy imagery (US)

• Many applications

  • Phobias

  • Substance abuse

  • Immune response

  • Sexual arousal

  • Digestion

  • Reproduction

  • Territory defence

  • Learning about good and bad foods

  • Breast feeding

  • Advertising

  • Relaxation or fear

Operant conditioning

• Involves adjusting our behaviour according to the consequences

  • Reinforced behaviour is more likely to be tried again

    • Example: a child punches another child to get a desired toy and it works; this child will likely try punching again

  • Punished behaviour is less likely to be tried in the future

    • Example: a child punches another child to get desired toy and gets sent to their room; this child is less likely to be punching again

  • Thorndike’s Law of Effect states that behaviours that are followed by favourable consequences become more likely, and behaviours follows by unfavourable consequences become less likely

• Skinner expanded on thorndike’s principles and wondered:

  • How can we more carefully measure the effect of consequences on behaviour

  • What else can creatures be taught to do by controlling consequences

  • What happens when we change the timing of reinforcement

• Skinner invented “the skinner box” or “operant chamber”, chich allowed detailed tracking rates of behaviour (lever pressing) over time

• Reinforcement refers to any feedback from the environment that makes a behaviour more likely to reoccur

  • Positive reinforcement: adding something desirable

  • Negative reinforcement: taking away something unpleasant

• A cycle of reinforcement: temper tantrums

  • What happens if the parent gives in to a temper tantrum???

    • The child's tantrum is positively reinforced, so the tantrums will get stronger and more frequent

    • The parent’s giving in behaviour is negatively reinforced, so the parent will give in sooner and more often

  • Punishment refers to any feedback from the environment that makes a behaviour less likely to recur

    • Positive punishment is when you ADD something unpleasant/aversive (scold the child)

    • Negative punishment is when you take away something pleasant/desired (no TV time, a time out)

  • The severity of punishment is not as helpful in decreasing a behaviour as making the punishments immediate and certain

  • The search for positives opposites - eg: don't fight becomes play nicely

    • In order to teach a desired behaviour, reinforce what's right more often than punishing what's wrong

• Overview: type of consequences

• pink= uses desirable stimuli

• grey= uses unpleasant stimuli

• Schedules of reinforcement= the rules of how often and when reinforcement is delivered

  • In continuous reinforcement, the subject is rewarded every time they perform the target behaviour

    • The behaviour is learned very quickly, but also stops quickly if reinforcement is no longer delivered

  • In partial/intermittent reinforcement, the subject is rewarded only some of the time for doing the target behaviour

    • It takes longer to learn the behaviour, but it will persist longer without reward

Comparing continuous and partial reinforcement schedules:

• Continuous reinforcement

  • Faster learning and faster extinction

• Partial reinforcement:

  • Slower learning and more resistant to extinction

Different schedules of partial/intermittent reinforcement

• Which reinforcement schedule produces the most responding (ie, more target behaviour)

  • Each schedule produces a predictable pattern of responses when number of responses is measured overtime

• Shaping a behaviour by rewarding successive approximations to the behaviour is a way to train a new behaviour

Observational learning

Observational learning = learning that occurs by observing the behaviour of a model

• Requires several processes:

  • Attention, memory, motor reproduction of behaviour, motivation

• Highly adaptive

  • If learning were trial and error on our own, we would learn very slowly

  • From watching others we learn how to do things, when to do things, ect

• Bandura’s bobo doll experiment showed that children are ready to learn from others

  • Children who watched an adult act aggressively towards the doll were more likely to behave aggressively than children who did not watch the adults act aggressively

• The presence of mirror neurons also shows that we are wired to learn from others

  • Mirror neurons fire in the same pattern when we watch others doing or feeling something as if we were doing the action or having the feeling ourselves

• Implications of our ‘readiness’ to learn from others in our modern time with ample media violence:

  • Research shows that viewing media violence leads to increased aggression and reduced prosocial behaviour (such as helping an injured person)

Learning and Cognition

• Early behaviourists would argue that learning cannot occur without reinforcement but:

  • Latent learning = learning that occurs without reinforcement and is not expressed in behaviour until reinforcement is available

• Early behaviourists would argue that there is no need to consider cognitive processes; BUT:

  • Insight learning = a sudden realisation of a solution to a problem or leap in understanding new concepts

Factors that facilitate learning

• Timing

  • Multiple exposures separated by time facilitates learning

    • Massed studying is ineffective compared to space studying

• Context effect:

  • Studying in several different locations facilitates learning

    • Minimises context effects

• Awareness and attention

• Although learning can happen without awareness, it is enhanced by awareness and attention

  • Attention can be driven by a ‘pop-out’ effect if one stimulus is noticeably different from the rest

  • Attention can be driven by active searching with more complicated stimuli

  • Attention can get in the way with stimuli that can be interpreted two ways

    • Example: the Stroop effect

CHAPTER 12

The nature of personality

• Personality = an individual’s unique constellation of consistent behavioural traits

  • A collection of stable states and characteristics

  • Varies from one individual to another

  • Influences choices and actions

The psychodynamic perspective

Freud’s psychodynamic theory focuses on:

• Unconscious determinants of behaviour

• Constant interplay of unconscious forces that often conflict with one another

  • Outward expression of this is personality

Structure of personality:

• Id

• At the unconscious level

• Innermost core of personality

• Operates according to the pleasure principle

• Ego:

  • At the conscious level (mainly)

  • Operates according to the reality principle

• Superego:

  • Moral aspect of personality

• The ego functions to keep the impulses of the id under control

• The ego feels anxiety if the impulses of the id threaten to get out of control

• To deal with anxiety, ego uses:

  • Realistic strategies

  • Defence mechanisms = weapons of the ego that operate unconsciously to distort reality

• Defence mechanisms:

  • Repression = thoughts and wishes remain in unconscious

    • A sexual abuse victim develops amnesia for the event

  • Sublimation = unacceptable impulses are presented as socially desirable behaviour

    • A man with hostile impulses becomes a reporter who ruins the careers of others with his stories

  • Denial = refusal to acknowledge the situation

    • A terminal cancer patient refuses to believe that won't recover

  • Displacement = finding a safe target

    • A man who was yelled at during work comes home and abuses his wife

  • Identification = unconsciously assuming the characteristics of a more powerful person in order to feel better about oneself

    • A person bullied as a child may become a bully in other situations in order to feel more powerful

  • Projection = an unacceptable impulse is attributed to others

    • A woman with a desire to have an affair represses this and accuses her husband of having an affair

  • Rationalisation = coming up with reasonable explanations for unacceptable feelings or behaviours to hide true motives

    • A teenager can justify stealing a shirt from Gap because it was overpriced and used child labour

  • Reaction formation = an opposite and exaggerated expression of the behaviour associated with the unacceptable impulse occurs

    • A mom represses her resentful feelings towards her child and becomes over protective

• The psychosexual stages of personality development:

  • Five stages, each focused on a specific pleasure sensitive are of the body

    • Adult personality is a function of progressing through these stages

    • Fixation = arrested development where instinct becomes focused on a particular area

• The psychosexual stages

  • Oral stage: 0-2 years

    • Weaning

    • Fixation = self indulgence, dependency

  • Anal stage: 2-3 years

    • Toilet training

    • Fixation = compulsive cleanliness and rigid rules or messy and dominant

  • Phallic stage: 4-6 years

    • oedipus/electra complex

      • Move from sexual attachment to opposite sex-parent to identification with same sex parent

  • Latency stage: 7 years-puberty

    • Period of dormant sexuality

  • Genital stage: puberty onwards

    • Formation of social and sexual relationships

• Evaluating freud’s theory:

  • Inadequate evidence

    • Small limited sample

    • Cannot be directly tested by scientific methods

  • Unconscious processes

    • Nonconscious processes have been demonstrated

  • Psychosexual stages

    • Concept of childhood sexuality rejected

    • The real issue is the importance of early experiences and emotional attachment

The humanistic perspective

• Abraham maslow

  • Hierarchy of needs

  • Self-actualization = highest human need to fulfil special potential

  • Studied healthy, well adjusted people

  • Led to study of positive psychology

• Carl Rogers

  • Self concept = consistent pattern of self perception describing how we see ourselves

  • Unconditional positive regard= acceptance without terms or conditions

  • Client centred therapy = worked on therapeutic atmosphere so client could it aside conditions of worth

Evaluating the humanistic perspective

• Not scientific, hard to test

• Simplistic view of human nature

• Contributions to therapeutic atmosphere

The trait perspective

• Personality traits describes an individual’s durable pattern of thinking, feeling and behaving

• What is the minimum number of traits that are necessary to describe anyone’s personality?

  • Use the statistical tool of factor analysis

• Hans eysenck

  • Identified three superfactors or traits that can vary from high to low

    • Extraversion

      • High = sociable, outgoing, risk taking

      • Low = shy, reserved, cautious

    • Neuroticism

      • high = emotionally worried, moody, temperamental

      • Low = emotionally stable, calm, even tempered

    • Psychoticism

      • High = impulsive, socially deviant, creative

      • Low = self controlled, disciplined

• Five factor model

Evaluating the trait perspective:

• Considerable stability in our personalities

• Genetic component to personality

• Oversimplify personality

• Describes personality but doesn't explain it

The situationist perspective

• Situationsim = the view that behaviour is governed by the situation rather than internal traits

  • Behaviourists would agree - Skinner, Thorndike

  • Thus, personality is a description of response tendencies that occur to specific environmental stimuli

The interactionist perspective

• Interactionism = the view that behaviour is governed the interaction between inner traits and the situation

  • Bandura’s idea of reciprocal determinism = bidirectional links between environment, behaviour and internal mental events

Personality Assessment

• Personality inventories = questionnaires used to assess various aspects of personality

  • Need to worry about social desirability bias = when participant answers in such a way to make themselves look good rather than truthfully

  • Include questions to look for this

• Two ways to develop items on personality inventories:

  • Rational approach

    • Based on theoretical conception of the trait

    • Items seem relevant to the trait

    • Eg: NEO-PI-R

      • Evaluates traits compromising three of five superfactors: Neuroticism, extraversion and openness

    • Empirical approach

      • Based on responses by ‘normals’ and psychiatric patients - items answered differently by these groups

      • Eg: MMPI-2

Example Jeffrey Dahmer MMPI-2 profile

• Protective tests = personality assessment in which the participant interprets ambiguous stimuli as a way to reveal unconscious content

  • Interpretation = ‘projection’ of inner needs, feelings, ways of viewing the world

  • Problem :

    • Different examiners may have different interpretations

• Two main types of projective tests:

  • Rorschach Inkblot test = shown inkblot and have to say what it looks like

    • Though to reveal underlying personality traits or conflicts

  • Thematic apperception test (TAT) = show scene and have to create story

Biological foundations of personality

• Many core dimensions of personality are influenced by genes

• Study this using family studies

  • Are identical twins raised together more alike than fraternal twins raised together? YES

    • Suggests genetic component

  • Are identical twins raised together more alike than identical twins raised apart? NO

    • Suggests genetic component

  • Are adoptive siblings raised together more alike than two random people raised apart? NO

    • Suggest environmental influences are minimal

• Similarity of pairs of identical and fraternal twins on the big five personality traits:

• L

• Personality and the brain:

  • Several brain areas involved

    • Amygdala - emotionality, fear and avoidance

      • Inhibited children may have am easily activated amygdala, causing feelings of fear and shyness

  • Several neurotransmitters involved

    • Levels of dopamine and serotonin linked with scores on dimensions of temperament

Differences in Personality

Gender differences in personality

• Similarities outnumber differences!

  • Women tend to:

    • Asses others emotion smore accurately

    • Score higher on social and connectedness traits

  • Men tend to:

    • Exhibit more individuality and autonomy

    • Show more physical aggression

Challenges of exploring cultural differences in personality:

• Translating measures of personality so the same question means the same thing to everyone

• Different response styles in different cultures

  • In collectivist cultures, it is not socially acceptable to say highly positive things about yourself

Cultural differences in personality:

• Collectivist cultures consider the needs of the group over that of the individual

• Score higher on measures of agreeableness

• Value harmony in interpersonal relationships

• Describe self as part of a group

Cultural differences in personality:

• Individualistic cultures value individual achievement and independence

• Score higher on measures of extraversion and openness

• Value privacy

• Describe self using personal traits

Chapter 15

Overview:

• What is abnormal?

• Models of abnormal behaviour

• Mood disorders

• Anxiety disorder

• Schizophrenia

• Somatic symptom and related disorders

• Dissociative disorders

• Personality disorders’

What is abnormal?

• A lot of grey area between what is normal and abnormal

• Varies across individuals and cultures

• When discussing psychological disorders, we should keep in mind:

  • Can we define disorders clearly enough so that we can know that we’re all referring to the same set of symptoms

  • How do we decide when a set of symptoms crosses the line and becomes a disorder that needs treatment

  • How can the label of a psychological diagnosis affect people

• Abnormal psychology = the scientific study of psychological disorders

  • No single definition agreed upon by everyone

  • Most definitions refer to the four D’s:

    • Devance - thoughts or emotions that fall outside cultural norms

    • Danger - behaviour increases risk of injury or harm to self or others

    • Distress - intense negative emotional reaction that doesn’t match the situation

    • Dysfunction - behaviour interferes with individuals daily functioning

• Diagnosing psychological disorders:

  • One reason to diagnose a disorder is to make decisions about the treatment

    • In order to treat a disorder, it helps to understand the cause of the psychological symptoms

• Classifying psychological disorders:

  • The diagnostic and statistical manual : DSM-V

    • The most complete description of over 350 mental disorders and criteria for diagnosing each

    • Assumes psychological disorders are no different from a physical illness

      • Symptoms, diagnosis, prognosis

    • Diagnostic information is represented along 5 dimensions or axes that consider both the person and their life situation

• Critiques of diagnosing with the DSM:

  • The DSM calls too many people ‘disordered’

  • The border between diagnoses or between disorder and normal, seems arbitrary

  • Decisions about what is a disorder seem to include value judgements

    • Is depression necessarily deviant?

  • Diagnostic labels direct how we view and interpret the world, telling us which behaviour and mental states to see as disordered

Models of Abnormal Behaviour

• Today's leading models of abnormality:

  • Neuroscience model

  • Psychodynamic approaches

  • Cognitive behavioural approaches

  • Socio-cultural approaches

  • Developmental psychopathology approach

• Neuroscience model:

  • Attributes abnormal functioning to structural or biochemical malfunctions in the brain

    • Genetic inheritance

    • Abnormal neurotransmitter levels

    • Viral infections

    • Hormones

    • Brain structure abnormalities

• Psychodynamic approaches:

  • Attributes abnormal functioning to unconscious conflicts that are often rooted in childhood

    • Defence mechanisms

    • Fixations

• Cognitive behavioural approaches

  • Attributes abnormal functioning to a mix of conditioning, modelling and cognitive processes

    • Behavioural perspective - conditioning processes

      • Classical and operant

    • Cognitive perspective - maladaptive thinking and beliefs

      • Selective perception, magnification and overgeneralization

• Socio-cultural approaches :

  • Attributes abnormal functioning to societal, cultural, social, and family pressures or conflict

  • Relation between abnormal functioning and factors such as:

    • Widespread social change

    • Socio-economic class

    • Social networks and support

    • Family systems

• Developmental psychopathology approach :

  • Attributes abnormal functioning to early risk factors combined with poor resilience throughout life stages

    • Risk factors = biological and environmental factors that contribute to problem outcomes

    • Resilience = the ability to recover from or avoid the serious effects of negative circumstances

    • Equifinality = children can start from different points and end up at the same outcome

    • Multifinality = children can start from the same point and end up at different outcomes

Mood Disorders

• Two states of mood disorders:

  • Depression = low, sad state in which people feel overwhelmed

    • Most people with a mood disorder suffer only from depression

    • Major depressive disorder is more severe than dysthymic disorder

  • Mania = elated and frenzied state in which people feel full of energy

    • People with bipolar disorder or the less severe cyclothymic disorder also experience mania

• Major depressive disorder (MDD)

  • Characterised by a depressed mood that is significantly disabling

  • Not caused by such factors as drugs or general medical condition

• Bipolar Disorder

  • Dominant mood is depression alternating with periods of mania

• Symptoms of MDD

  • Emotional – depressed mood

  • Motivational – loss of desire to do activities; lack of drive

  • Behavioural – less active and productive; may move and speak slowly

  • Cognitive – negative self-evaluation, self-blame, pessimism, guilt, difficulty concentrating, thoughts of suicide

  • Physical – fatigue, sleep and eating disturbances, headaches, dizziness, pain

• Depression is everywhere :

  • Per year, 8% of Canadians are diagnosed with MDD

    • Women are twice as likely

• Explanations for MDD:

  • Genetics:

    • DNA linkage analysis reveals depressed gene areas

    • Twin studies:

    • 

  • The brain:

    • Brain activity is diminished in depression and increased in mania

    • Brain structure: smaller frontal lobes in depression ad fewer axons in bipolar disorder

    • Brain chemistry

      • More norepinephrine (arousing) in mania, less in depression

      • Reduced serotonin in depression

  • Cognitive-behavioural theorists:

    • Learned helplessness

    • Attribution-helplessness theory

      • Internal + stable + global = depression

    • Negative thinking and/or dysfunctional attitudes

      • Magnification, overgeneralization

    • Automatic thoughts

    • The cognitive triad

    • 

• Bipolar disorders:

  • Involves experiencing repeated periods of two polar opposite moods : depression and mania

    • Typical pattern is 3-7 weeks of depression followed by 3-7 days of mania

  • Affects roughly 2% of all adults

  • Symptoms of mania :

    • Emotional - powerful highs

    • Motivational - seeks excitement and companionship

    • Behavioural - may move and speak quickly

    • Cognitive - poor judgement, optimism, grandiosity (cannot see the difference between what we can and can't do)

    • Physical - energetic, requires little sleep

• Explanations for bipolar disorder:

  • Genetics :

    • Gene abnormalities

    • Irregularities in ios that allow neurons to communicate (sodium potassium pump not working)

  • Other causes :

    • Stress + biological predisposition

    • Life events - striving, failures

• Suicide

  • 3500 suicides every year in Canada, 100x more attempts

  • 2nd most frequent cause of death among high school and college students

    • Women 3x more attempts than men

    • Men 3x more success than women (choose more lethal methods than females)

  • Warning signs

    • 80% of people that attempted to commit have told someone before hand

    • Verbal or behavioural threat

    • Detailed plan

    • Previous attempts

• Anxiety disorders

  • Anxiety disorders = a category of disorders involving fear or nervousness that is out of proportion to the situation and is maladaptive

  • Six types:

    • Generalised anxiety disorder

    • Social anxiety disorder

    • Phobias

    • Panic disorder

    • Obsessive compulsive disorder

    • Post traumatic stress disorder

  • Generalised anxiety disorders

    • Feeling worried or anxious most of the time

    • Free-floating anxiety not attached to any subject

    • Constant worry interferes with ability to concentrate, sleep and eat

    • Feels restless, edgy and easily tired

• Explanations for generalised anxiety disorder:

  • Cognitive- behavioural theorists:

    • Assumption that one is in danger

    • Intolerance of uncertainty theory - unwilling to accept negative events

  • Neuroscientists:

    • Malfunctioning GABA feedback system

    • Malfunctioning emotional brain circuit

  • Social anxiety disorder:

    • Severe, persistent fear of embarrassment in social situations

    • Fear of talking in public, of functioning poorly in front of others

    • Affects more women than men, more poor people than wealthy people

      • Roughly 7% of the population will have it in any given year, 12% in their lifetime

      • Often begins in late childhood or adolescence

  • Explanation for social anxiety disorder:

    • Cognitive behavioural theorists:

      • Dysfunctional cognitions about social situations

      • Unrealistically high social standards

      • View oneself as socially unattractive and unskilled

  • Phobias

    • Strong, irrational fears of objects or situations

      • Most develop during childhood, adolescence or young adulthood

      • Affects roughly 8% of people in Canada in any year

    • uncontrollable , irrational, intense desire to avoid the object of the phobia

    • Seldom go away on their own

      • Can intensify over time

    • Explanations for phobias:

      • Classically conditioned fear

      • Avoidance behaviours are reinforced through operant conditioning

      • Modelling of fearful behaviour

    • 10 most common phobias:

      • Spiders – arachnophobia

      • Heights – acrophobia

      • Public, social places – agoraphobia

      • Social situations – social phobia

      • Flying – aerophobia

      • Enclosed spaces – claustrophobia

      • Thunder – brontophobia

      • Germs – mysophobia

      • Cancer – carcinophobia

      • Death – necrophobia

• Panic disorder:

  • Anxiety response occurs suddenly, unpredictably and is very intense

    • Many minutes of intense dread or terror

    • Chest mains, choking, numbness

    • A feeling of need to escape

  • As a result, the person lives in fear of the next attack and changes their behaviour to avoid panic attacks

    • Agoraphobia

  • Explanations for panic disorder:

    • Malfunctioning brain circuit and excess norepinephrine

    • Misinterpretation of bodily sensations

• Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)

  • An anxiety disorder in which individuals are plagued by unwanted repetitive thoughts and tend to engage in repetitive behaviours

    • Obsessions = cognitive component

      • Repetitive and unwelcome thoughts

    • Compulsions = behavioural component

      • Repetitive behavioural response as an attempt to ease the anxiety from the bad thoughts

    • Percentage of OCD clients reporting obsessions and compulsions:

    • 

  • Explanations for OCD:

    • Cognitive behavioural theorists:

      • Learning that compulsive behaviour relieves distress

    • Neuroscientists:

      • Low serotonin activity

      • Overactive orbitofrontal cortex and caudate nuclei

      • Cingulate cortex and hypothalamus activate the OCD impulses

      • Amygdala drives the fear and anxiety components of the OCD response

• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)

  • Persistent depression and anxiety after a traumatic event

    • Hyperalertness, easily startled, sleep disturbances, guilt, anxiety, depression, difficulty with concentration

  • Lasts more than a month, may begin shortly after or years after the event

    • Acute stress disorder (ASD) = lasts less than a month and begins within 4 weeks of the event

      • 80% of ASD cases develop into PTSD

• Explanations for PTSD:

  • Biological factors

    • Increased cortisol and norepinephrine

    • Damaged hippocampus, amygdala

  • Personality

    • Perceive negative events as beyond their control

  • Negative childhood experiences

    • Poverty, family member with psychological disorder, trauma, parents divorce prior to 10 years

  • Weak social support

Schizophrenia

• Schizophrenia = split mind

  • A mental disorder characterised by disorganised thought, lack of contact with reality, and sometimes hallucinations

  • Most characteristic symptoms:

    • Hallucinations = alterations in perception

    • Delusions = beliefs that are not based on reality

    • Disorganised behaviour = ‘all over the place’ to the extent that completing a task is difficult (eg: basic hygiene, cooking, shopping, going places, etc…)

      • Loose associations or derailment = rapid shifts in topic

• Categories of symptoms of schizophrenia:

  • Positive symptoms: presence of problem behaviours; pathological excess in behaviour

    • Delusions, disorganised thinking and speech, hallucinations, inappropriate affect

  • Negative symptoms: absence of healthy behaviours: pathological deficits in behaviour

    • Lack of speech, flat affect, loss of volition, social withdrawal

  • Cognitive symptoms: impairment in cognitive functions

    • Problems with memory, executive function, working memory, intelligence

  • Psychomotor symptoms: abnormal movements

    • Awkward movements, odd gestures, catatonia

• Onset and development:

  • Onset: typically, schizophrenic symptoms appear at the end of adolescence and in early adulthood, later for women than for men

  • Prevalence: roughly 1 out of every 100 people develop schizophrenia, equal men and women

• Explanations for schizophrenia:

  • Genetics:

    • The more genetic similarity an individual has to a person with schizophrenia, the more likely that they will also develop the disorder

    • Likely a complex genetic combination, not a single gene

  • Abnormal brain structure:

    • Smaller temporal lobes and frontal lobes

    • Structural abnormalities of the hippocampus, amygdala and thalamus

    • Cerebral ventricles 20-30% larger in schizophrenics

    • 

  • Biochemical abnormalities:

    • Too many dopamines receptors help to explain paranoia and hallucinations

      • Antipsychotic drugs decrease dopamine activity and alleviate symptoms of schizophrenia

    • Abnormal glutamate and serotonin activity may also play a role

Somatic Symptom and Related Disorders

• Somatic symptom and related disorders:

  • Excessive thought, feelings, and behaviours related to somatic symptoms

  • Experience genuine symptoms and repeated medical examinations/procedures/treatments, yet no medical explanation for their symptoms

  • Five types of somatic symptom and related disorders:

    • Somatic symptom disorder, illness anxiety disorder, conversion disorder, psychological factors affecting other medical conditions, and factitious disorder

• Somatic symptom disorder:

  • Three criteria

1. One or more somatic symptoms that cause distress and significant disruption in daily life

   1. Symptoms usually include pain, gastrointestinal symptoms, sexual symptoms, and neurological symptoms

2. Excessive health-related anxiety and time/energy devoted to somatic complaint

3. Concern has lasted over 6 months

• Illness anxiety disorder:

  • The individual is preoccupied with having a serious disease despite lack of somatic symptoms

    • Excessive care-seeking for over 6 months

    • Excessive illness behaviours

  • Defining feature here is minimal or no symptoms

    • With symptoms, this would be somatic symptom disorder

• Conversion disorder:

  • The development of sudden symptoms suggestive of neurological damage, yet perfectly healthy

    • Blindness, paralysis, seizures, loss of feeling

  • Individual is unconcerned with their symptoms

  • Onset usually following extreme stress and may last for weeks

  • Extremely rare, 5 in every 1000 people

  • Different from malingering – lie about symptoms to avoid an unwanted responsibility

• Psychological factors affecting other medical conditions:

  • When psychological factors adversely affect a documented medical condition

    • May worsen an existing medical condition or create a new health risk

• Factitious disorder:

  • When an individual purposely assumes physical or psychological symptoms in order to adopt the patient role

    • May lie about symptoms or take steps to make themselves ill or cause bodily harm

  • Factitious disorder imposed on another:

    • When one person deliberately harms another and then presents the harmed one to the doctor and presents themselves as the caregiver (usually parent-child)

• Explanations for somatic symptom and related disorders:

  • Behaviourists – classical conditioning of fears; modelling

  • Cognitive theorists – misinterpret bodily cues; very sensitive to bodily cues

  • Socio-cultural theorists – many non-Western cultures transform personal distress into somatic complaints/symptoms

Dissociative Disorders

• Dissociation refers to a separation of conscious awareness from thoughts, memory, bodily sensation, feelings, or even from identity

  • It can serve as a psychological escape from an overwhelmingly stressful situation

• A dissociative disorder refers to dysfunction and distress caused by chronic and severe dissociation; three types:

  • Dissociative amnesia, depersonalization/derealization disorder, dissociative identity disorder

• Dissociative amnesia:

  • Loss of memory with no known physical cause; inability to recall selected memories

• Depersonalization/derealization disorder:

  • A strong feeling of disconnection from one’s regular identity and awareness; usually triggered by stress

• Dissociative identity disorder (DID):

  • Development of separate personalities; formerly called ‘multiple personality disorder’

  • Each identity is unique

    • Not in consciousness at the same time

    • May or may not know about each other

    • One identity may be protector, another a child

• Explanations for dissociative disorders:

  • Psychoanalytic perspective: repression

  • Cognitive perspective: coping with abuse

  • Learning perspective: dissociation pays

  • Social influence: therapists encourage

  • Biological approach: smaller hippocampus and amygdala

Personality Disorders

• A stable, ingrained, inflexible, and maladaptive way of thinking, feeling, and behaving

• Ten specific personality disorders fall into one of three clusters of disorders:

  • Dramatic & impulsive behaviours *focus here*

    • *Antisocial*, *borderline*, histrionic, and narcissistic personality disorders

• Anxiety & fearfulness

  • Avoidant, dependent, and obsessive-compulsive personality disorders

• Odd & eccentric behaviours

  • Paranoid, schizoid, and schizotypal personality disorders

• Antisocial personality disorder

  • 3 : 1 male – female ratio

  • Lack a conscience & empathy

  • Fail to respond to punishment

  • Disregard for others’ rights or preferences

  • May be charming & manipulative

  • Diagnosis – at least 18 years of age with antisocial behaviour before 15

• Antisocial personality disorder does not automatically mean criminality!

  • Many career criminals show empathy and selflessness with family and friends

  • Many people with APD do not commit crimes

• Explanations for antisocial personality disorder:

• Behavioural theories:

  • Modelling – parents have antisocial personalities

    • Operant conditioning – parents reward the wrong behaviour

• Biological factors:

  • Lower serotonin – linked with impulsivity and aggression

    • Deficient functioning of the frontal lobes – linked with poor planning, inferior judgments, low empathy

    • Less anxiety – may be why they don’t learn from negative consequences

• Borderline personality disorder:

  • Intense extremes between positive and negative emotions

  • Unstable sense of self

  • Impulsivity and volatility

  • Difficulty with social relationships

• Explanations for borderline personality disorder

  • Biosocial theory- child has difficulty identifying and controlling emotions, and the emotions are punished or disregarded

Chapter 16

Overview

• The nature of therapy

• Biological treatments

• Psychodynamic therapies

• Behaviour therapies

• Cognitive-behavioural therapies

• Humanistic and existential therapies

• Formats of therapy

• Does therapy work?

The nature of therapy

• Goals of treatment:

  • To help change maladaptive thoughts, feelings, and/or behaviours

• Three features of all therapies:

  • A sufferer who seeks help

  • A trained, socially accepted healer

  • A series of contacts with the goal of changing maladaptive thoughts, feeling, and/or behaviours

• Types of treatment:

  • Psychotherapy

    • An interactive experience with a trained professional, working understand and changing behaviour, thinking, relationships and emotions

  • Biological therapy

    • The use of medications and other procedures acting directly on the body to reduce the symptoms of mental disorders

• Who seeks therapy?

  • 30% of North Americans will seek professional counselling at some point in their life

    • ¾ of them will seek help for anxiety or depression

    • ⅔ of them will be women, ⅓ will be men

  • However, ⅔ of people who would seek help don't, why not?

    • Stigma about mental illness

    • Lack of confidence that treatment will help

• Who are clinicians?

  • Clinical psychologists

  • Psychiatrists

  • Counsellors

  • Social workers

• Where is the treatment conducted?

  • Public institutions, such as hospitals and clinics, schools, and private offices

    • Most people are treated as outpatients

      • Deinstitutionalization movement began in 1960s

      • People with severe psychological disorders often face a cycle of in and out of the hospital → the revolving door

  • Canadian Mental Health Act

    • Outlines patient rights and conditions for involuntary for admittance to hospitals

Biological Treatments

• Interventions in the brain and body can affect mood and behaviour

• Biological treatments alter the brain’s functioning by changing its chemistry with medications, or affectug=ng its circuitry with electrical or magnetic impulses or surgery

  • Drug therapy

  • Electroconvulsive therapy

  • Psychosurgery

• Drug Therapy:

  • Psychotropic drug = drug that acts primarily on the brain

    • Most prescriptions for anti-anxiety drugs, antidepressants, mood stabilisers and antipsychotics

  • Anti-anxiety drugs:

    • Valium, Xanax, Prozac

    • Designed to reduce anxiety without affecting alertness or concentration

    • Slows down excitatory synaptic activity

    • Side effects: drowsiness, lethargy, dependance

    • Newer drugs: enhance inhibitory GABA, fewer side effects

  • Antidepressants

    • Elavil, Nardil, prozac, paxil, zoloft

    • Designed to improve mood and reduce other symptoms of depression

    • Work by increasing levels of serotonin, norepinephrine and dopamine

    • Three types of antidepressants:

    • MAO inhibitors, tricyclics, and selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)

  • Mood stabilisers:

    • Lithonate (lithium)

      • Standard treatment for bipolar disorder from 1950’s to 1980’s

      • Many serious side effects

    • Designed to improve intense shifts in mood from on extreme state to another

  • Antipsychotics = major tranquilizers

    • Thorazine, clozaril, risperdal

    • Designed to reduce symptoms of schizophrenia, especially ‘positive’ symptoms (delusions, hallucinations)

    • Work by decreasing the action of dopamine

    • Side effects: obesity, diabetes, movement problems

      • Tardive dyskinesia = odd facial, tongue and body movements

  • Keep in mind that drug therapies

    • Do not cure the disorder

    • Do not r=teach the client coping and problem solving skills to deal with stress

    • Can bring symptoms under control and other therapeutic techniques can be incorporated

  • Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT):

    • Used to treat depression by sending an electrical current through the brain, producing a brain seizure

      • Effects can be immediate

      • 60-70% improve

        • Can cause memory problems

    • Procedure:

      • Patient given sedative and muscle relaxant

      • Placed on well padded mattress

      • Shocked less than 1 second, causing seizures of CNS

  • Transcranial magnetic stimulation

    • A noninvasive procedure used to treat depression

    • Stimulates a focal area of the frontal lobes with powerful magnetic field

    • 

  • Vagus nerve stimulation

    • An implanted pulse generator sends electrical signals to a specific region of the brain

    • Helps reduce depression in many people

    • 

  • Psychosurgery:

    • Procedures that remove or destroy parts of the brain

      • Least used of biomedical procedures

  • Lobotomy

    • Destroy nerve tracts to frontal lobes

      • Treatment for schizophrenia in the 1930’s and 1940s

  • Strengths

    • Biological Treatments often work when other treatments have failed

    • Research offers promising options

  • Criticism

    • Undesirable side effects

    • Ignores environmental effects

Psychodynamic therapies

• Several types of psychodynamic therapies:

  • psychoanalysis , short term psychodynamic therapy, relational psychoanalytic therapy

  • Goal is to help patients release tension of repression and resolve unconscious inner conflicts

• Psychodynamic techniques:

  • Free association

    • Uncensored, verbal reports of thoughts, feelings or images that enter awareness

  • Dream interpretation

    • Therapist helps client understand the symbolic meaning of their dreams

  • Resistance

    • Defensive manoeuvres that hinder the process of therapy are signs that sensitive material is being approached

  • Transference

    • When the client shifts feelings for figures from childhood on to the therapist

• How do psychodynamic therapies help clients?

  • Catharsis - reliving of past repressed feelings to resolve conflicts

    • Must be accompanied by intellectual insight

      • Very time consuming

    • Working through - repeatedly examining an issue to improve insight

  • Strengths:

    • First to suggest psychological instead of biological treatment

      • Ie, traumatic childhood events can affect later psychological health

    • Led to man other psychological treatments

  • Criticisms:

    • No empirical support for effectiveness of therapy

Behaviour Therapies

• Behavioural therapies focus on behaviour

  • Abnormal behaviours are learned

  • Maladaptive behaviours can be unlearned though:

    • Classical conditioning

    • Operant conditioning

    • Modelling

  • Behavioural therapy is often effective for treating phobias and anxiety issues

• Classical conditioning techniques:

  • Exposure approach:

    • Treat phobias through exposure to feared CS (stimulus) without being allowed to escape

      • Eliminate anxiety through extinction

    • Two types:

      • Flooding:

        • Extensive exposure to the feared CS until there is no more fear

      • Systematic desensitisation:

        • Progressing through a fear hierarchy while practising at each step

      • Example of a fear hierarchy for systematic desensitisation

• Aversion therapy:

  • A person learns to associate the stimulus that they desire (alcohol, drugs, source of sexual fetish, etc.) with something aversive

  • 

• Operant conditioning treatments:

  • Use positive reinforcement, extinction, negative reinforcement or punishment

    • Attempt to increase or decrease specific behaviours

  • Works best in ‘closed systems’ = institutions and schools

  • Token economies =

    • System for strengthening desired behaviours through application of positive reinforcement

    • Tokens given for desirable behaviours

    • Tokens exchanged for tangible reinforces

• Strengths:

  • A lot of empirical evidence

  • Effective for many problems

• Criticism

  • Change may not always be long-lasting

  • Not effective for some disorders

  • The distress is non-specific (generalised anxiety disorder) schizophrenia

Cognitive-behavioural therapies

• Therapy that works on problem thoughts and behaviours

  • Behavioural - work on gaining skills they may be lacking

  • Cognitive - work on building more functional thinking habits

  • Three kinds of therapy :

    • Ellis’ rational-emotive behavioural therapy

    • Beck’s cognitive therapy

    • Second-wave cognitive behavioural therapies

• Ellis’ Rational-Emotive Therapy:

  • Goal is to identify irrational assumptions that lead to disordered emotional and behavioural responses

  • Point out irrational assumptions

  • Model the use of alternative assumptions

  • Uses cognitive restructuring

  • Effective for anxiety and assertiveness problems

  • 

• Beck’s Cognitive Therapy:

  • Widely used for depression

    • About as effective as drug therapy (⅔ improve)

    • Also used for panic disorder and social anxiety disorder

  • Therapist helps client identify negative thoughts and perceptions, and guides them to apply alternative ways of thinking

• Second-wave cognitive behavioural therapies:

  • Recognize problematic thoughts as just thoughts

  • Learn to accept thoughts rather than try to eliminate them

• Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy

  • Used for treating generalised anxiety disorder

• Strengths:

  • Well supported by research

  • Good at treating depression, social anxiety disorder, generalised anxiety disorder, panic disorder, sexual dysfunctions and other disorders

• Criticism:

  • Role of cognition unclear (cause or effect?)

  • Unclear whether cognitive, behavioural, or a combination of both are effective

Humanistic and Existential therapies

• Humanists - we are all born with the tools to fulfil our potential

• Existentialists - accept responsibility for or lives and choices

• Gestalt therapy - guide clients toward self-acceptance by challenging and frustrating them

• Rogers' client centred therapy:

  • How to create a therapeutic environment in which clients can see themselves honestly and with acceptance?

  • Three important therapist attributes:

    • •Unconditional positive regard

      • Total acceptance of client

    • •Accurate empathy

      • Willingness and ability to view the world through client’s eyes

    • Genuineness

      • Sincere communication

• Gestalt Therapy:

  • Goal is to bring feelings, wishes, and thoughts into immediate awareness

  • Awareness makes client ‘whole’ again

  • Methods:

    • Often carried out in

    • Uses role-playing

    • More active and dramatic approaches the client-centred

• Strengths:

  • Appealing to clinicians

  • Emphasises positive human qualities

• Criticism

  • Difficult to research; little research done

Formats of therapy

• Individual therapy - one on one with therapist and client

• Group therapy - therapist meets with several clients with similar problems simultaneously

  • Hope that client benefits from hearing others’ pov

    • Group therapy, family therapy, couples therapy

• Self help groups - people with similar problems meet for support without guidance from clinician

Does therapy work?

• Empirically supported treatments should be used

  • Treatments that have been tested and evaluated

• Several problems:

  • Spontaneous remission

    • Sometimes people get better with no treatment at all

• Difficulties with psychotherapy research:

  • Ethics of having a control group

  • Many variables not controlled

  • Therapist-client interactions varied

  • Measuring therapeutic effects

  • Who measures outcomes

• Empirically supported treatments come from psychotherapy research that involves randomised clinical trials – APA guidelines:

  • Random assignments of clients to experimental or control group

  • Treatment procedures are standardised

  • Double-blind procedure minimises researcher bias and placebo effects

  • Some behavioural measures to assess improvement

  • Need follow-up data

• Is therapy generally effective?

  • Yes! More effective than no treatment or placebo

  • 

• Are particular therapies effective for particular problems?

  • YES!

  • Behavioural = phobias

  • Cognitive-behavioural = social anxiety disorder, generalised anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and depression

  • Drug therapy = schizophrenia and bipolar disorder

• What factors affect the effectiveness of a treatment?

  • –Client variables:

  • •Openness to therapy

  • •Ability to understand own internal states

  • •Problem needs to ‘fit’ with therapy being used

• Therapist variables:

  • Empathy, genuineness, caring, trust, acceptance

  • •Eclecticism – willingness to combine treatments for the benefit of a client

• Techniques:

  • Need appropriate technique for client and situation

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