Unit 5 study guide AP Psych

Introduction to Health Psychology

• Behavioral medicine: study of how stress influences health & illness

• Health psychology: subfield of psychology that explores the impact of psychological, behavioral, & cultural factors on health & wellness; psychology’s contribution to behavioral medicine

• Psychoneuroimmunology: study of how psychological, neural, & endocrine processes together affect our immune system & resulting health (branch of health psychology)

Stress

• Stress: process by which we perceive & respond to certain events, called stressors

• Lazarus’s Cognitive Appraisal Theory: we appraise stressors as threatening or challenging 

  • Eustress: stress that is positive & motivating (see the stressor as a challenge)

  • Distress: stress that is negative & debilitating (see the stressor as a threat)

• Catastrophes: large scale disasters

• Significant life changes: having a loved one die, moving, losing a job, parents getting divorced, going to college, etc. 

• Daily hassles & social stress: annoying siblings, to-do lists, dropping off & picking up children, etc.

• Biogenic Stressors: Substances that activate nervous system activity

• Approach & avoidance motives: the drive to move toward (approach) or away from (avoid) a stimulus (purposed by Kurt Lewin)

• Approach-approach conflict: least stressful conflict; have to choose between desirable options

• Avoidance-avoidance conflict: have to choose between undesirable options

• Approach-avoidance conflict:most stressful; have to choose between options that have both desirable & undesirable qualities

• Sympathetic NS: triggers a fight, flight, or freeze response (fast)

• Endocrine system: releases adrenaline and cortisol (slow)

• General adaptation syndrome: body’s adaptive response to stress in three phases - alarm, resistance, & exhaustion (purposed by Hans Selye)

  • Phase 1 - alarm reaction: sympathetic nervous system is activated & body is mobilized for a threat (heart rate increases, blood diverted to muscles)

  • Phase 2 - resistance: body is summoning all resources to meet the challenge (temperate, blood pressure, & respiration run high; adrenaline pumped into bloodstream)

  • Phase 3 - exhaustion: body’s resources are depleted; become more vulnerable to illness, collapse, or death

• Tend-and-befriend response: under stress, people (especially women) may nurture themselves & others (tend) & bond with & seek support from others (befriend)

• Type A personality: Friedman & Rosenman’s term for competitive, hard-driving, impatient, verbally aggressive, & anger-prone people - linked to coronary heart disease

• Catharsis: idea that “releasing” aggressive energy (through action or fantasy) relieves aggressive urges

• Problem-focused coping: attempting to alleviate stress directly - by changing the stressor or the way we interact with that stressor

• Emotion-focused coping: attempting to alleviate stress by avoiding or ignoring a stressor & attending to emotional needs related to our stress reaction

Positive Psychology

• Positive psychology: scientific study of human flourishing, with the goals of promoting strengths & virtues that foster well-being, resilience, & positive emotions, & that help individuals & communities thrive

• Personal control: our sense of controlling our environment rather than feeling helpless

• Learned helplessness:  the hopelessness & passive resignation humans & other animals learn when unable to avoid repeated aversive events (purposed by Martin Seligman)

• External locus of control: perception that outside forces beyond our personal control determine our fate

• Internal locus of control: perception that we control our own fate

• Self-control: ability to control impulses & delay short-term gratification for greater long-term rewards

• Feel-good, do-good phenomenon: people’s tendency to be helpful when in a good mood

• Adaptation-level phenomenon: tendency of individuals to judge new stimuli or situations based on their past experiences

• Relative deprivation: perception that we are worse off relative to those with whom we compare ourselves

• “Happiness set point”:  general level of happiness from which we slightly fluctuate

• Broaden-and-build theory:  proposes that positive emotions broaden our awareness, which over time helps us build novel & meaningful skills & resilience that improve well-being

• Resilience: personal strength that helps people cope with stress & recover from adversity & even trauma

• Aerobic exercise:  sustained exercise that increases heart & lung fitness; also helps alleviate depression & anxiety

• Biofeedback: system of recording, amplifying, & feeding back information about subtle physiological responses in an effort to help people control them

• Mindfulness meditation:  reflective practice in which people attend to current experiences in a nonjudgmental & accepting manner

• Gratitude: an appreciative emotion people often experience when they benefit from other’s actions or recognize their own good fortune

Diagnosing Psychological Disorders

• Psychopathology: mental disorder

• Maladaptive: dysfunctional behavior that interferes with a person’s ability to function normally in one or more important areas of life.

• Distressful: unpleasant feelings or emotions that impact a person’s level of functioning.

• Medical model: a way of helping people with abnormal behavior: diagnose, treat, cure.

• DSM-5: The book used for classifying psychological disorders by medical professionals.

Neurodevelopmental 

• Neurodevelopmental Disorders: characterized by developmental deficits that produce impairments of personal, social, academic or occupational functioning.

  • Types:

• Intellectual developmental disorders

• Communication disorders

• Autism spectrum disorder

• Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder

• Specific learning disorder

• Motor disorders

• Autism Spectrum Disorder: a group of developmental disabilities that can cause significant social, communication and behavioral challenges.

• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: characterized by a pattern of behavior, present in multiple settings (e.g., school and home), that can result in performance issues in social, educational, or work settings. 

Schizophrenia

• Schizophrenia: characterized by abnormal thinking, perceptions, and losing touch with reality.

  • Types of schizophrenia:

• Schizotypal (Personality) disorder

• Delusional disorder

• Brief psychotic disorder

• Schizophreniform disorder

• Schizophrenia

• Schizoaffective disorder

• Delusions: a bizarre or farfetched belief that continues in spite of competing contradictory evidence.

  • Delusions of reference: believing that hidden messages are being sent to you via newspaper, TV, radio, or magazines.

  • Delusions of grandeur: believing you are someone very powerful or important, such as Napoleon.

  • Delusions of persecution: believing that spies, aliens, the government, or even your neighbors are plotting against you.

• Hallucinations: a false or distorted perception that seems vividly real to the person experiencing it. The hallucinations can include hearing voices, seeing people, or even smelling things that are not really there.

• Positive symptoms: characteristics of schizophrenia that are added to a person’s personality, such as hallucinations, delusions, inappropriate emotions, and word salad.

• Negative symptoms: characteristics of schizophrenia that are taken away from a person’s personality, such as flattening of the emotions and speech, apathy, a general disinterest in life and social withdrawal. People with the negative symptoms of schizophrenia will often neglect themselves and their appearance and alcohol and substance abuse is quite common.

• Genetic basis for schizophrenia: the risk of developing schizophrenia increases if there is schizophrenia in the family.

• Dopamine hypothesis: over activity of certain dopamine neurons may cause some forms of schizophrenia, especially those that involve hallucinations and delusions. Antipsychotic medications block the excess dopamine activity to reduce the hallucinations and delusions.

• Diathesis-stress model: people inherit a predisposition or diathesis that increases their risk of schizophrenia; stressful life experiences then trigger schizophrenic episodes.

• Viral effects: mothers who catch certain viruses, such as the flu, while pregnant may increase the risk of brain abnormalities in babies leading to schizophrenia.

Bipolar 

• Bipolar and Related Disorders: includes changes in mood and changes in activity or energy.

  • Types of Bipolar:

• Bipolar I

• Bipolar II

• Bipolar I disorder: one experiences repeated episodes of both mania and depression.

• Bipolar II disorder: one never develops severe mania, but instead experiences hypomania — mild to moderate mania that doesn't usually lead to as much disruptive behavior as severe mania. Bipolar II disorder occurs when episodes of hypomania alternate with depression.

Depressive Disorders

• Depressive Disorders: includes disorders that have the presence of sad, empty, or irritable mood, accompanied by somatic and cognitive changes that significantly affect the individual’s capacity to function.

  • Types of Depressive Disorders:

• Major depressive disorder

• Persistent depressive disorder (Dysthymia)

• Disruptive mood dysregulation disorder

• Premenstrual dysphoric disorder

• Major (Unipolar) Depression: characterized by a lasting and continuous depressed mood. People suffering from major depression often feel lethargic and deeply discouraged leading some to have suicidal thoughts. Approximately 10% of those suffering major depression attempt suicide, but it is not until they are coming out of their depression.

• Persistent Depressive Disorder (Dysthymia): a type of depression in which the symptoms are not as severe as major depression. It is characterized by chronic sadness, loss of interest in activities, and low energy.

Anxiety Disorders

• Anxiety disorders: includes disorders that share features of excessive fear and anxiety and related behavioral disturbances.

  • Types of Anxiety disorders:

• Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD)

• Social Anxiety Disorder

• Separation Anxiety Disorder

• Panic Disorder

• Specific Phobia

• Agoraphobia

• Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD): characterized by persistent, uncontrollable, and ongoing apprehension about a wide range of life situations. The cause of the anxiety cannot be pinpointed. GAD can cause chronic fatigue and irritability. It affects twice as many women as men.

• Panic Disorder: characterized by sudden episodes of extreme anxiety and panic attacks. The attacks can last up to an hour in some cases and involve a pounding heart, rapid breathing, sudden dizziness, a feeling of lightheadedness, choking, sweating, vomiting, and diarrhea.

• Phobias: characterized by a strong, irrational fear of specific objects or situations that are normally considered harmless. 

• Agoraphobia: fear of public places and open places

OCD and Related Disorders

• Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: Characterized by persistent, repetitive, and unwanted thoughts (obsessions) and behaviors (compulsions). In order to relieve the anxiety-provoking thoughts, one performs behaviors, or rituals. These can include repeatedly checking things, cleaning things, straightening things, etc.

Trauma Related Disorders

• Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD): characterized by intense feelings of anxiety, horror, and helplessness after experiencing a traumatic event such as a violent crime, military combat, or natural disaster. People who suffer from PTSD can experience flashbacks, nightmares, depression, uncontrollable crying, irritability, and an inability to concentrate and maintain relationships.

Dissociative Disorders

• Dissociative identity disorder (formerly known as multiple personality disorder): characterized by the presence of two or more distinct personalities in the same individual. Each personality has its own name, unique memories, behaviors, and self-image. DID usually occurs from a traumatic childhood event.

• Dissociative amnesia: characterized by a partial or total inability to recall past experiences and important information. This is typically in response to a traumatic event or stressful situation, such as military combat or marital problems.

Somatic Disorders

• Conversion disorder: characterized by paralysis, blindness, deafness, or other loss of sensation, but with no discernable physical cause.

• Illness Anxiety Disorder (Hypochondriasis): an exaggerated concern about health and illness. A person suffering from hypochondriasis frequently meets with doctors and constantly reads about health symptoms.

Personality Disorders

• Personality disorders: an enduring pattern of inner experience and behavior that deviates from the expectations of the individual’s culture.

• Paranoid personality disorder: characterized by high levels of suspiciousness of the motives and intentions of others but w/out the outright paranoid delusions associated with paranoid schizophrenia. (More common in men)

• Histrionic personality disorder: characterized by being excessively dramatic, egocentric, and seeking attention and tending to overreact. (More common in women)

• Narcissistic personality disorder: characterized by being unrealistically self-important, manipulative, lacking empathy, and not being able to take criticism. (More common in men)

• Borderline personality disorder: characterized by being emotionally unstable,

• impulsive, unpredictable, irritable, and prone to boredom. (More common in women)

• Antisocial personality disorder: characterized by violating other people’s rights without guilt or remorse, being manipulative, exploitive, self-indulgent, and irresponsible. (More common in men)

• Avoidant personality disorder: characterized by being excessively sensitive to potential rejection and humiliation.

• Obsessive-compulsive personality disorder: characterized by usually being preoccupied with rules, schedules, and details, being extremely conventional, serious, and emotionally insensitive.

Treatment

• Psychotherapy: an emotionally charged, confiding interaction between a trained therapist and someone who suffers from psychological difficulties.

• Eclectic Approach: an approach to psychotherapy that, depending on the client’s problems, uses or integrates techniques from various forms of therapy (also known as psychotherapy integration)

Psychoanalysis

• Psychoanalysis: Freud believed the patient’s free associations, resistances, dreams, and transferences- and the therapist’s interpretations of them- released previously repressed feelings, allowing the patient to gain self-insight.

• Resistance:  blocking from consciousness of anxiety-laden material

• Interpretation: that analyst’s noting supposed dream meanings, resistances, and other significant behaviors in order to promote insight

• Transference: the patient’s transfer to the analyst of emotions linked with other relationships

Humanistic

• Person-Centered Therapy: humanistic therapy developed by Carl Rogers; therapist uses techniques such as active listening within a genuine, accepting. Empathic environment to facilitate clients’ growth

• Active Listening: empathic listening in which the listener echoes, restates, and clarifies

Behavioral Therapy

• Behavior Therapy: therapy that applies learning principles to the elimination of unwanted behaviors

• Counterconditioning: Procedure that conditions new responses to stimuli that trigger unwanted behaviors, based on classical conditioning, includes systematic desensitization and aversive conditioning.

• Systematic Desensitization: Type of counterconditioning associates a pleasant, relaxed state with gradually increasing anxiety-triggering stimuli, commonly used to treat phobias.

• Aversive Conditioning: Type of counterconditioning that associates an unpleasant state with an unwanted behavior, think about the alcohol/nausea example. 

• Token Economy: An operant conditioning procedure that rewards desired behavior patient exchanges a token of some sort, earned for exhibiting the desired behavior, for various privileges or treats.

Cognitive Therapy

• Cognitive Therapy: Teaches people new, more adaptive ways of thinking and acting based on the assumption that thoughts intervene between events and our emotional reactions

• Rational-Emotive Therapy: Confrontational cognitive therapy developed by Albert Ellis, 

• vigorously challenges people’s illogical, self-defeating attitudes and assumptions. Also called rational-emotive behavior therapy by Ellis, emphasizing a behavioral “homework” component. 

Biomedical Therapies

• Psychopharmacology: study of the effects of drugs on mind and behavior

• Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT): therapy for severely depressed patients in which a brief electric current is sent through the brain of an anesthetized patient

• Psychosurgery: surgery that removes destroyed brain tissue in an effort to change behavior

• Lobotomy: a now rare psychosurgical procedure once used to calm uncontrollably emotional or violent patients

• Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS): In TMS, a pulsating magnetic coil is placed over prefrontal regions of the brain to treat depression, with minimal side effects.

Drug Therapy

• Classical antipsychotics: Remove a number of positive symptoms associated with schizophrenia, like agitation, delusions and hallucination. [Chlorpromazine (Thorazine)]

• Atypical antipsychotics: Remove negative symptoms associated with schizophrenia, like apathy, concentration difficulties, difficulty in interacting with others. [Clozapine (Clozaril)]

• Antianxiety drugs: Depresses central nervous system and reduce anxiety and tension by elevating the levels of the Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) neurotransmitter. (Xanax and Ativan)

• Antidepressant drugs: Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) and improve mood by elevating the levels of serotonin by inhibiting reuptake. (Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil)

• Lithium: Mood stabilizer used to treat the symptoms of bipolar. 

Types of Therapists

• Clinical psychologists: Mostly PhDs. Expert in research, assessment, and therapy, supplemented by a supervised internship.

• Clinical or Psychiatric Social Worker: Master of Social Work plus postgraduate supervision prepares some social workers to offer psychotherapy, mostly to people with everyday personal and family problems.

• Counselors: Pastoral counselors, abuse counselors work with a problems arising from family relations and substance abuse and with spouse and child abusers and their victims.

• Psychiatrists: Physicians who specialize in the treatment of psychological disorders. Not all psychiatrists have had extensive training in psychotherapy, but as MDs they can prescribe medications. 

Alternative Therapies

• Light Exposure Therapy: Used to help patients suffering from SAD, a light lamp will boost vitamin D and help patients maintain their natural circadian rhythm.

• Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR): EMDR uses a variety of external stimuli while the patient is asked questions about upset or traumatic events. After many sessions the trauma will be reprocessed and the patient should be able to discuss the event without symptoms.

• Pet Therapy: Patients, especially those suffering from PTSD, have reported the beneficial effects of having a therapy session with a certified therapy dog present.