Chapter 16
Psychological Disorders
Abnormal Behavior
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Read the dictionary http://www.yourdictionary.com definition of
abnormal (type in abnormal and select Go)
Here is another view
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~langley/book/abnormal1.html
Medical model defines psychological disorders as illnesses and
treats them as you would a physical disease
Bio-Psycho-Social perspective seen them as a product of
biological, psychological and sociological influences
– This interdisciplinary approach is now more commonly used
The DSM-IV
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To classify disorders, psychologists use the DSM-IV
– Book containing all the diagnostic labels for psychological disorders
– Uses symptoms (behaviors) to determine diagnoses
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Book is organized into categories of psychological disorders
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Read the American Psychiatric Association's FAQs
http://www.psych.org/public_info/dsm.pdf about the DSM
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Within each category are the actual diagnostic labels
This is a PDF file and you will need Adobe Acrobat to read it – you can find it here
http://www.adobe.com
The DSM-IV….
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Not without its critics
– Do symptoms presume mental illness?
– Should diagnoses include an explanation of cause?
– Is it reliable (see Chapter 11 for the definition of reliability)?
– Does it bring in too many problems and call them mental
problems?
– Are they just arbitrary labels
Negative Effects of Labeling
Categorizes people
 Gives impression all people with same label act the same
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– All depressed people do not act the same
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Labels can be incorrect
– Imagine mistakenly diagnosing a child as mentally retarded
Labels tend to stay with the person for ever
 People often react to the label and not the person
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Positives
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Offers an explanation for behavior
– People are entitled to know what is wrong with them
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Label leads to treatment
– Different diagnoses require different types of treatment
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Qualifies people for benefits
– Insurance payments
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Conclusion – the positives outweigh the negatives so we
continue to use labels
Anxiety Disorders
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Generalized anxiety disorder comprises vague and intense
fears and worries that are not attached to anything specific
– Person finds themselves in a constant state of autonomic
arousal (see Chapter 2) and feels tense and apprehensive
– Read about generalized anxiety disorder
http://www.adaa.org/AnxietyDisorderInfor/GAD.cfm
Anxiety Disorders….
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Panic disorder is a sudden and severe anxiety attack that occurs
without warning or cause
– Usually accompanied by symptoms resembling a heart attack
– Sometimes with agoraphobia – see next
– This site discusses panic disorder
http://www.adaa.org/AnxietyDisorderInfor/PanicDisAgor.cfm and
agoraphobia
• The panic disorder site and each of the following ones describing anxiety disorders has
a self test for the disorder
• The questions on the tests are meant to get you thinking about the disorder and are not
meant to diagnose you
Anxiety Disorders….
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Specific phobia is an unrealistic fear of a specific situation,
person, or event
– Acrophobia – fear of heights
– Claustrophobia – fear of enclosed places
– Triskaidekaphobia – fear of number 13
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Social phobia is a fear of public embarrassment
– Public speaking
– Eating in public
Anxiety Disorders….
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Agoraphobia is a fear of being separated form a place of security
such as your home
– Often results in people restricting their environment
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Read more about specific phobia
http://www.adaa.org/AnxietyDisorderInfor/SpecificPhobia.cfm and
social phobia
http://www.adaa.org/AnxietyDisorderInfor/SocialPhobia.cfm
Just for fun read a list of phobias http://phobialist.com
Anxiety Disorders….
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Obsessive compulsive disorders
– Obsessions are repeating thoughts that are disturbing
– Compulsions are repeating behaviors and/or repeating ritualistic behaviors
that serve the purpose of reducing anxiety
– Hand washing behavior – obsession is about germs, compulsion is washing
hands
– Washing one’s hands reduces the anxiety generated while thinking about
coming into contact with germs
– Read about obsessive compulsive disorders
http://www.adaa.org/AnxietyDisorderInfor/OCD.cfm
Mood Disorders
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Major depressive disorder
– Very severe depression
– People often unable to care for themselves
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Dysthymic disorder is a less severe form of depression
Bipolar disorder is a combination of major depression and
mania
– Mania
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Extremely high activity level
Poor judgment
Pressured speech
Flight of ideas
Mood Disorders….
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This page has a set of links about bipolar disorder
http://www.psycom.net/depression.central.bipolar.html –
explore some of them to learn more about the disorder
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Here is a list of famous people
http://www.bpkeepers.org/famous/famous.html who
are/were bipolar
– I take no responsibility for its accuracy although it is not at all
uncommon for bipolars to be very creative people
Mood Disorders….
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Biological influences
– Depression runs in families and identical twins are more likely to
both have the disorder than fraternal twins
– Neurotransmitters norepinephrine and serotonin are low in
depressed people
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Social-Cognitive perspective
– Self-defeating beliefs – people have negative beliefs about
themselves and the situations they are in
Mood Disorders….
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Social-Cognitive perspective….
– Attributions of blame – how you attribute blame for bad life
events
• Depressed people are global (will affect everything), stable (last forever),
and internal (my fault)
– This makes change difficult
– Being in a bad mood tends to cause you to view events
negatively
– Being in a bad mood and negative thinking tend to feed on each
other with each making the other worse
Mood Disorders….
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The cycle of depression
– Stressful events interpreted through a pessimistic style creates a
hopeless depressed state resulting a change in the way a
person thinks and acts thus resulting in more depression and
negative experiences starting the cycle over
Suicide
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Side effect of depression
Number two killer of college students
More women attempt, more men succeed
Not everyone gives clues
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Presents moral issues
– Should people have the right to kill themselves?
– What is other’s responsibility for your suicidal behavior?
Suicide….
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Test your knowledge about suicide by taking this quiz
http://www.sfsuicide.org/html/quiz.html
Read about warning signs
http://www.sfsuicide.org/html/warning.html and statistics
http://mypage.iusb.edu/~jmcintos/SuicideStats.html
Here http://www.suicidology.org/index.cfm is a national nonprofit
dedicated to the understanding and prevention of suicide
Schizophrenic Disorders
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Literally translated means split mind
– The split is between rationality and irrationality – it is not a split personality
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Characterized by some disturbance in thought or behavior
Thought disturbances
– Loose associations are rambling unconnected thoughts
– Hallucinations are sensory experience with no sensory input
• Auditory most common
– Delusions are false belief systems
• Paranoid – people are out to get you
• Grandiose – belief you are someone famous
Schizophrenic Disorders….
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Disturbances of behavior
– Very active or not active at all
– Bizarre or odd behavior
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Inappropriate affect
Sometimes classified as chronic/process (slow onset and long
lasting) or acute/reactive (quick onset and short lived)
Subtypes
– Paranoid – characterized by suspicious behavior and paranoid delusions
Schizophrenic Disorders….
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Subtypes….
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Catatonic – disturbances in behavior usually extremely limited movement
Disorganized – bizarre and childlike behaviors
Undifferentiated – doesn’t neatly fit into one of the above categories
Residual – had a schizophrenic episode but is not now actively
schizophrenic
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Here is a series of links describing various aspects of
schizophrenia from the schizophrenia home page
http://www.schizophrenia.com/newsletter/newpages/student.html
Schizophrenic Disorders….
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How does it happen?
– Schizophrenics have an excess of dopamine
– They have abnormal brain activity
• Low activity in frontal lobes
– They have enlarged fluid filled areas and less cerebral tissue
– May be a link to mothers having the flu during pregnancy
– Twin and adoption studies offer a suggestion of genetics
Personality Disorders
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Inflexible and enduring patterns of behavior resulting in conflict with
society
Antisocial personality disorder
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Frequent violations of society's rules
Sometimes leads to criminal behavior
Lack of remorse for behavior
Lack of conscious to prevent behavior
Blames others for their problems
Manipulative and can appear as charming
This site has a series of links about antisocial disorder
http://www.mentalhealth.com/dis/p20-pe04.html
Personality Disorders….
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Schizoid personality disorder
– Lacks feelings of warmth for others
– No desire for social relationships
– Seen as cold distant and unfeeling
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Borderline personality disorder
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Marked instability of mood, self image, and interpersonal relationships
Feel uncomfortable being alone
Manipulate others into a relationship
Laura's page http://www.laura_d.dds.nl/index.html approaches borderline
disorder form a different angle – she has borderline and describes what is
like
Personality Disorders….
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Narcissistic personality disorder
– Exaggerated sense of self importance
– Appears to be in love with one’s self
– In need of constant attention and admiration
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Several others in the text
Theory of Origin
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As you read the text, you will see there are many different
theories of how psychological disorders come about
– Which if any are correct is debatable
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One hypothesis is that all disorders are caused by a
combination of four factors
– Genetics, stress, vulnerability, coping skills
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Many disorders seem to have a genetic basis
– They are likely to run in families
– There is evidence form other types of research such as adoption
and twin studies
Theory of Origin
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People have different levels of vulnerability to both stress
and to particular disorders
– Determines which disorder you will develop
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Stress levels increase in one’s life
Coping mechanisms are inadequate to handle the stress
A mental disorder results
This is one model and not necessarily the correct one