Anxiety Disorders
Anxiety Disorders
• Characterized by generalized
apprehension, worry, and a variety of
physical symptoms
•
•
•
•
•
Generalized Anxiety Disorder
Phobias
Panic Disorder
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD)
6.8 million, 3.1%
•Women are twice as likely to be
affected than men.
•Very likely to be comorbid with
other disorders.
Generalized Anxiety Disorder
• Experiencing a continuous, generalized
feeling of anxiety (reaction to vague or
imagined dangers) – 6 months or more
• Anxiety in many different areas of life
• Accompanied by physical symptoms…
muscle tension, trouble sleeping,
irritability, lack of concentration,
headaches, fatigue, inability to relax,
twitching/trembling, etc.
Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD)
15 million, 6.8%
•It is equally common among
men and women.
Specific Phobias
19 million, 8.7%
•Women are twice as likely to be
affected as men.
Phobias
• Specific Phobia
– Severe anxiety is
focused on a
specific object or
situation
– Examples:
• Enclosed spaces
• Snakes
• Spiders
• Heights
• Flying
• Social Phobia
– Fear of
embarrassing
oneself in a social
situation
– Speaking, eating,
using bathroom in
public
• Agoraphobia
– “fear of the
marketplace”
– Associated with
panic disorder
PHOBIAS
Common and uncommon phobias
100
Percentage 90
of people 80
surveyed 70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Snakes
Being Mice Flying Being Spiders Thunder Being Dogs
in high,
on an closed in, and
and
alone
exposed
airplane in a
insects lightning In a
places
small
house
place
at night
Afraid of it
Bothers slightly
Not at all afraid of it
Driving Being
Cats
a car
In a
crowd
of people
PHOBIAS
Treatment
Exposure Treatment
Flooding
Counter-Conditioning
Systematic Desensitization
(1) training the patient to physically relax
(2) establishing an anxiety hierarchy of the stimuli
(3) counter-conditioning relaxation responding to ea. feared
stimulus
Biofeedback
Modeling
Panic Disorder
6 million, 2.7%
•Women are twice as likely to be
affected than men.
•Very high comorbidity rate with
major depression.
Panic Disorder
• Frequent Panic Attacks or fear of them:
– Sudden and unexplainable attacks of
intense fear
– Come on with/without warning
– Not associated with a stimulus
– Individual fears that he/she is about to die
– Physical symptoms…choking, tightness in
chest, difficulty breathing, nausea, dizziness
– Commonly occurs with Agoraphobia
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
2.2 million, 1.0%
•Equally common among men and
women.
•One-third of affected adults first
experienced symptoms in childhood.
•OCD costs the U.S. 6% of the total
$148 billion mental health bill.
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
• OBSESSIONS
– Intrusive and
uncontrollable
thoughts
– Contamination,
safety, etc.
• COMPULSIONS
– Ritualistic and
purposeless actions
– Cleaning, washing,
checking, etc.
• O and C are
usually related…
compulsions help
to decrease the
anxiety caused by
the obsession
• This pattern
begins to interfere
with functioning
OCD
Common Obsessions and Compulsions Among
People With Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
Thought or Behavior
Percentage*
Reporting Symptom
Obsessions (repetitive thoughts)
Concern with dirt, germs, or toxins
40
Something terrible happening (fire, death, illness)
24
Symmetry order, or exactness
17
Compulsions (repetitive behaviors)
Excessive hand washing, bathing, tooth brushing,
or grooming
85
Repeating rituals (in/out of a door,
up/down from a chair)
Checking doors, locks, appliances,
car brake, homework
51
46
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
7.7 million, 3.5%
•Women are more likely to be
affected than men.
•Rape is the most likely trigger of
PTSD, 65% of men and 45.9% of
women who are raped will develop
the disorder.
•Childhood sexual abuse is a strong
predictor of lifetime likelihood for
developing PTSD.
Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
• Common among veterans of combat,
survivors of accidents and disasters,
victims of crimes, etc.
• Feel long-lasting after-effects of trauma
• Flashbacks, nightmares, insomnia, mood
symptoms, stimulus generalization
• Symptoms last more than 1 month… up
to years later