Special Populations
Week 1
Abnormal = deviate from norm
- Ppl are not abnormal
- Abnormal as negative connotations
- What is deviating?
Psychopathology = study of MD
- Behaviour
o Can only see this
o Other two are internal
§ There may be clues but only actually know behaviour
- Emotion
- Cognition (thinking and perceiving)
- Atypical behaviour = reflects deviations in underlying mental processes (emotion and
cognition)
o Stimming
o Hyperactivity
o Pacing
Developmental Norms = typical rates of growth of skill, language and cognition
- More deviation in babies bc so much is happening at once
- Is the red guy atypical to the blue group?
o Don’t know culture
Cultural Relativism theory
- no universal standards of how we judge behaviour, cognition and emotions
- Bc difference in culture
- Only atypical if its within own culture
Case of Shyness
- Western culture are worried with shyness
- In China it is valued to be anxious and quiet shown to be good to adapt in environment
and make good rel
o In speech task Chinese kids showed less social gaze, speaking and smiling
- Kong et al. = diff b/w anxious shyness (restrained with fear and anxiety) and regulated
shyness (self-consciousness avoidance of public attention and social restraint)
o Anxious shyness = social anxiety in China and Canada
o Regulated shyness = social anxiety only in Canada and NOT China
- Eye contact = nonverbal communication
o Some other culture can be seen as confrontational or rude
o Our culture means we are paying attention
Cultural Context
- In north America when kids act out, ppl think its normal (will grow out of it)
- In Thailand = little patience for hitting and arguing
- When comparing classrooms western teacher still found it ok with aggression levels even
though it was higher in west than Thailand (Thai teacher still complained even though
aggression was lower compared to West)
- Asian and Latin have bodily systems of shyness than west
- With more globalization = eating disorder have become more prominent around world
Cultural Relativism
- Szasz = societies label groups as abnormal to justify controlling/silencing them
- However culture can influence
o The way symptoms are expressed
o Ppls willingness to admit certain behaviours
§ Certain eskimo groups limit anger
o Treatments deemed acceptable or helpful
- Situational context very important to diagnose
Week 2
Standard Deviation
- Left with 2.5% on each side at the bottom + top
- Deviations in bottom 2.5 cause with distress or dysfunction
Deviations Interfere with Adaptation
- Adaptation = fitting into circumstance of your life
o Being able to function at school/work
o Have social rel./collaborate
o Taking care of urslef (to avoid/deal with stress)
- Abnormality interferes with adaptation
Developmental Norms
- Must consider
o Behaviour frequency
o Behaviour intensity
o Duration of behaviour
o Situational context
APA
- MD = syndrome of clinically sig behavioural, cognitive or emotional disturbances
o reflect dysfunction in underlying mental processes
o distress or disability in function
Neurodiversity
- non-medical term who’s brains functions diff than ‘typical pop.’
- Usually associated with diff strengths + challenges than rest of pop.
Research Method
- Look at pic for scientific method
- Psychological constructs = intangible aspects of one’s psych that we can’t measure
directly
- Researchers rely on operationalization (construct concrete measurable terms)
Types of measurement
- Systematic observation
o Directly observing behaviour
o Naturistic observation = behaviours observed in real life situation
§ Time sampling = look at periods of time and within that time frame
observe if they do the behaviour you are looking for using yes/no
§ Event sampling = how many times are they doing the behavior
• Need to include when they start and stop
Limitations = no controlled variables, may act diff if the child is aware of
researcher, event may never happen naturally
o Structured observations
§ Creating setting likely to elicit behaviour of interest
§ Experiment where child meets stranger
• Look for facial expression, body movement, eye contact
§ Operational definition = what EXACTLY does behaviour look like
• Ex fidgeting where there’s a scale with description of each
• Look over coding scheme
o Limitation of both
§ Observer bias = researcher notice behaviour that support hypothesis +
discount those who don’t or interpret behaviour that supports hypothesis
• Have multiple ppl weigh in
• blind experimenter
§ observer influence = participant change behaviour bc they’re being
observed
§ Habituation = allows participant get used to researcher
Parent/self reports
o Parent reports = parents answers questions about topic of interest
§ Kids are bad at being insightful
§ Start asking kids at 8-10
§ Easy bc scaling is simple
o Child behaviour checklist varies by age
§ Many diff subscales (scale w/i bigger scale)
§ Internalizing behaviour = shows how child is feeling directed inward
§ Externalizing = involves other children to express behaviour
§ Girl boy form are same except for norms
§ Not used for diagnosis
§ Above dotted line = concerning behaviour
Sampling behaviour with tasks
Video with children
o boy
§ Fidgeting
§ Nervous
§ Making eye contact with camera
§ Still willing to talk
o Girl
§ Fidgets more with hands + tucking in to themselves (old evolutionary
behaviour of protecting neck or show submissiveness)
§ Stares at prof mostly
§ Less talkative + comfortable
§ Hard time maintain gaze
Social desirability bias = participants answer in a way that more socially acceptable
Show kids two pics and ask if they more like one or the other and then use small/big
circles to determine the intensity (ex are u good at puzzles?/ how good are u at puzzles)
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Sampling behaviour with tasks
- Attempts sample behaviours of interest when can’t be observed
Week 3
Designs for Studyong Age-Rel Change
- Cross Sectional - Testing children of different ages at one particular point of development
- Longitudinal - Same individuals (one cohort) are observed or tested repeatedly at
different points in their lives
o Limitations
§ Practice Effects - Improvement over time can be attributed to practice with
a particular test. Participants may improve at the taskthe more often they
attempt it in trials
§ Selective Attrition - Those who drop out of the study may be significantly
different from remaining participants
§ Cohort Effects - Each generation of people have unique differences in
their development
- Accelerated Longitudinal - A sample of people of various ages are studied again in the
future longitudinally
o Take multiple cohorts, each a different age, and observe them for less time than a
longitudinal study. This works because you get more age-related observations in a
shorter amount of time
o Easier to account for practice and cohort effects
o Another approach: Longitudinal study as normal, but as people drop out, add new
participants who are the same age and study them cross-sectionally (ideally the
new kids are similar enough to yield accurate results)
- Correlational Study- Relations between variables as they exist naturally in the world
o Variables that cannot be manipulated in an experiment
o Correlation Coefficient (r) tells us about the strength and direction of the
relationship
- Third variable problem -> There can be a third, separate variable that explains the
correlation you observe (when measuring relationship between number of friends and
grades at school, parents might actually explain the effects you observe)
Experimental Study
- Two types
o Randomized - participants are assigned to the experimental groupsrandomly
(random assignment)
o Quasi-Experimental - subjects are not randomly assigned, usually because there is
a distinguishing factor between the groups that we cannot randomize (ex. One
group has children with Depression and the other group does not)
o Allows us to make causal conclusions
o Must involve an Independent Variable, Dependent Variable, and Variables held
constant
Case Study
- Single participant that is unique in a way that is of interest to us (ex. Someone with an
ED who is also blind)
- Can also be used if the intervention method is unique or expensive•
Reversal Design -> Also called ABA (A is baseline, B is treatment)
- Investigates if the participants worsen if they are not undergoing treatment
- Does the treatment need to continue to be implemented for the benefits to continue?
- This design is limited to interventions without lasting changes (like drugs) or where there
is behavioral change
o Ex. Does this drug have lasting effects for this condition?
- Ethical considerations apply. Cannot occur if the patient may experience
- significant distress from losing treatment
- Another approach -> Multiple Baseline Design. Only AB (no reversals) but vary how
long the patients are in baseline before treatment.
o Can also separate multiple behaviors or multiple parts of treatment
§ (ex. Measuring amount of tantrums and measuring throwing things in a
child with anger issues under different treatments methods to see what
methods help what behavior)
Normal Development
- ‘Typically developing’
- Developmental psychopathology perspective = integrates understanding + study of
normal developmental process with those of child and adol. psychopathology
Mother with food? or Mother with comfort?
- Baby monkey was shown two mothers one with food but resembled a cage and the other
resembled a mother to provide comfort
- Babies preferred comfort over food
Attachment
- Enduring social-emotional relationship
- Bowlby = children who form a healthy attachment are more likely to survive (generally
one person)
- Usually mom is primary caregiver bc historically they have been the care giver
(maternity leave/breast feeding)
- Stages
o 1. Pre-attachment (birth to 6 weeks)
§ Try to get person attention
§ Will smile/cry
o 2. Attachment-in-the-making (6 weeks-8 months)
§ Behaves diff with familiar vs unfamiliar ppl
o 3. Clear-cut attachment (6 months-24 months)
§ Attachment figure is singled out
§ Trust to provide needs
o 4. Goal-corrected partnership (24 months on)
§ True reciprocal rel
§ Both give and take
- The strange situation
o Generally measure attachment this way
o Can figure out what type of attachment they have
Types of Attachment
-
Secure attachment = 60-65% baby may/may not cry when mother leaves and returns but
baby wants to be with her
o Higher quality friendships, fewer problems with peer
o Higher quality romantic rel
- Insecure attachment = higher anxiety, aggression and anger
o Avoidant attachment = 20% baby not visibly upset when mother leaves and
returns
§ May ignore her
o Resistant attachment= 10-15% baby upset when mother leaves + when she returns
hard to console
o Disorganized attachment = 5-10% baby seems confused when mother leaves and
returns
§ Doesn’t understand what’s happening
- Internal working model = set of expectations about caregiver’s availability
responsiveness in times of stress
o Will follow though to world view
o Eg secure attachment in childhood = can depend on others and trust new ppl
o Eg insecure attachment in childhood = will block ppl out, feel anxious about
future romantic/platonic rel
o Early secure attachment doesn’t mean later supportive parental rel (not linear)
Attachment and Emotion Regulation
- Secure attachment = supports early regulation
- Emotion regulation = ability to exert control over your emotional state
Emotion
- Experiencing emotion involves
o Private feelings
o Bodily reaction in autonomic nervous system arousal
o Overt behavioural expression (diff levels and can experience positive or negative)
§ Before 2 years we start teaching regulation
§ From 2-4 child learns regulation independently by being by themselves
(daycare/preschool)
- Co-regulation
o Parent steps in to help regulate emotion
o Parent and child physiologically regulate together and become similar during
close contact like cuddling (slower heart rate and blood pressure)