Unit 11 Raw
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Unit 11 Raw
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Unit 12 – Abnormal
Psychology and Treatment
Neurodevelopmental Disorders
Schizophrenic Spectrum Disorders
Bipolar Disorders
Depressive Disorders
Anxiety Disorders
Chronic vs. episodic
• Chronic = long lasting and over time
• Episodic = varied lengths of episodes, not consistent
Neurodevelopmental
• ASD
• Social communication disorder
• Specific Learning Disorder
• ADHD
• Intellectual disability
Schizophrenia Spectrum
• Disorders based on an error of selective attention
• What is selective attention?
Delusions and Hallucinations
• Delusions – irrational, unjustifiable, usually paranoid belief
• Delusions of grandeur – “I am King Louis XIV!!”
• Delusions of persecution – “The government is after me!!”
• Hallucinations – perception of nonexistent, external stimuli
• Can be visual or auditory
• MOST are auditory
Disorganized Speech
• Frequent derailment or incoherent speech
• Ex: Word salad
• “The potato snake ate the sun spotted dinosaur cupholder of unique!”
Grossly disorganized or abnormal motor:
• Jerky movements, atypical behavior
Negative Symptoms
• Remember negative means TAKING SOMETHING AWAY
• Catatonia – flat affect (like no one is home)
• All emotion is taken out, person lacks all energy
• Positive symptoms – adding a symptom (i.e. hallucinations or
delusions)
Specifiers of Schizophrenia
Paranoid
preoccupations with delusions and hallucinations.
Catatonic
immobility or excessive purposeless movements.
Disorganized
disorganized speech or behavior, inappropriate
emotions. Word Salads: scrambled or nonsensical
speech.
symptoms, but doesn't fit above models.
Undifferentiated
Residual
Withdrawal, after hallucinations and delusions have
disappeared
Causes of Schizophrenia
• Psychological - triggering experiences, genes predisposed but some
react to traumatic triggers by developing schizophrenia.
• They vary.
Biochemical Causes
• Prenatal: It is also thought to perhaps be triggered or caused by the
introduction of a prenatal virus that affects brain development, possibly
in the thalamus.
• People conceived in winter months are more apt to develop schizophrenia in
Northern hemisphere, while the reverse is true in the Southern.
• Drug use: Amphetamines and cocaine sometimes intensify symptoms.
• Dopamine is also associated with physical movement, disruption of is associated
with schizophrenia.
• Brain anatomy:they have abnormal brain tissue, low frontal lobe activity.
• Thalamus: reactions are smaller than normal and are reactive--that may
cause brain overstimulation.
Rule of Thirds
• 1/3 of people who develop schizophrenia
only have one episode
• 1/3 have reoccurring episodes
• 1/3 are chronic with unremitting symptoms.
Genetic Factors
• Definite genetic link: the closer you are genetically to someone with
Schizophrenia, the more likely you are to get it.
• 1 in 100 people get it.
• 1 in 10 of siblings
• 1 in 2 identical twins, even if raised apart
Dopamine Hypothesis
• Biochemical: 6 times the normal amount of dopamine receptors
that increase brain activity to manic levels.
• Thus dopamine blockers reduce symptoms.
Bipolar and related disorders (previous manic
depressive)
• alternates between hopelessness and lethargy of depression and
over-excited manic state.
• Mania - typically over-talkative; overactive; little or no sleep; highly
impulsive, loud, flighty, hard to interrupt sexually less-inhibited.
Grandiose optimism and self-esteem. May be very irritable.
• High levels of norepinephrine found
• Hyper vs. hypo?
• After mania, people fall back to either a normal state or into a
depressed state
Bipolar - Causes
• Genetic: tends to run in families, genetic predisposition
• Biological: serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine don’t function
properly
• Environmental: stress, major life event
• Genetic expression
Bipolar 1
• Classic type of bipolar
• Individuals experience both
manic and depressive
episodes at varying lengths
Bipolar 2
• Involves less severe manic episodes, depressive episodes are the
same
Differences?
• Bipolar 1 is more severe than bipolar 2.
• They used to be mood disorders, but mania is not based in emotion –
it’s based more in a possible delusional state where the person may
take on a new identity.
• Florida case
Depressive Disorders (previously mood disorders)
• Disorders related to emotions
Major Depressive Disorder
• two or more weeks of depressed mood, intense feelings of
worthlessness and hopelessness; and diminished interest in things
that were once considered pleasurable.
• People feel like they are in a deep black hole with no way to get out.
The hopeless feeling often prevents them from seeing any reason to
try to get out. Very dangerous illness.
Persistent Depressive Disorder
• Also called dysthymia
• chronic low level depression lasting for at least 2 years; the feelings
aren't as intense, but they last longer. Difficult to detect because of
the lack of intensity but takes a large toll on body and psychology
systems.
Premenstrual dysphoric disorder
• Symptoms of menstrual cycles do not improve following menses
• PMS is chronic
• Examples?
Anxiety Disorders
• Disorders related to autonomic nervous system abnormalities
(possible endocrinology states)
Psychoanalytic repressed feelings during childhood symbolized by
trigger.
Behavioral
Biological
learned fear, which has been reinforced, or social
learning, imitating others who has fear like parents.
May be generalized from other learned experiences-one dog to all dogs.
predisposed genetically to be afraid of things that
can cause death: snakes, spiders, height, enclosed
places, disease.
GAD
Persistent symptoms of an excited sympathetic, nervous system: sweating,
heart racing, dizziness, shaky accompanied by persistent negative feelings
and fear…not triggered by specific events.
Specific Phobia
persistent, irrational fear of a specific object of situation – key
feature is the presence of a phobic stimulus
Panic Disorder
unpredictable, minutes long intense anxiety attack, as if you're going to be
killed any second, but no specific, real threat is apparent.
Agoraphobia
The individual fears or avoids situations because the thought of
escape might be difficult or help may not be available
Social Anxiety Disorder
Social phobia – fear/distress over social situations
Separation Anxiety Disorder
Consistent fear from separation from home or attachment
figures
Selective Mutism
Individuals may fail to speak because of fear of negative
evaluation